Double Helix book 7 - The Final Solution
by TD Master
Summary: Sequel to Wormhole Dead Ahead. A truly twisted Immortal wants to wipe out all life in the Galaxy and Dana Scully is the only one between him and his goal.
1. Default Chapter

Title: Double Helix Book 7: The Final Solution  
Author: 3D Master  
Feedback: 3d.master@chello.nl  
Rating: PG-13  
Keywords: X-Over Star Trek(The Next Generation/New  
Frontier)/Highlander/X-Files. Sequel to  
Nothingness and Wormhole Dead ahead. Tie in  
with the book series Double Helix. No reading  
of the books, or the earlier stories required,  
but it will add so much more to the story.  
Spoilers: Double Helix  
Character Listing: Dana Scully, Duncan MacLeod, Cast of New  
Frontier and The Next Generation.  
Summery: The Federation was horribly wrong when they  
thought they had the culprit responsible for  
the Double Helix virus. It turns out the real  
creator is infinitely more evil and powerful.  
  
Disclaimer: The character Dana Scully does not belong to  
me, but to Chris Carter and 1013 productions.  
Star Trek belongs to Paramount. Highlander to  
Panzer/Davis Productions.  
  
Author's Notes: Aah, back again. For those who've made me your  
favorite author you'll be extremely happy. The  
next story came from reading the Double Helix  
books. Every time I picked up the next  
installment I more and more got the impression  
we were dealing with some seriously sick,  
twisted individual that must be behind the  
virus. Somebody old and with far too much time  
on his hands, somebody who can't die of a  
little virus... somebody immortal. Thul was  
great character and bad guy though... for a  
pawn. Enjoy.  
  
Double Helix Book 7:  
  
The Final Solution  
  
by 3D Master (3d.master@chello.nl)  
  
Prologue: The Story  
  
Dana listened to Fox Mulder's story, while a fire crackled,  
throwing ghostly shadows around the clearing. Animal sounds came  
from the forest around them, some sounded familiar, most  
completely alien. The trees -- all of which grew with a muscle-  
like substance in their stems and plateaus, these plateaus of  
strong green material lined the stems, veins ran across them,  
which pumped a blue liquid around the plant -- made gentle hissing  
sound as the wind rocked them back and forth. On most plateaus  
there would be buzzing of animal activity, all working in a  
symbiotic nature with the tree. Some trees were different, they  
had more traditional branches, not made of wood, but of muscle.  
The branches would occasionally swoop down and grab a tasty treat,  
after which it would move back up, where it let its digestive  
fluids digest the animal.  
  
Four more people sat around the fire: a girl with the name  
Diari Mulder -- Fox' wife -- a Tinry, by the name of . . . well,  
it was really unpronounceable, after a few stuttering attempts of  
the other five present, they had settled on Din, a female Driak --  
by definition sensual to a fault -- named Frianne, a male Orion,  
listening to Eran and finally a male Leln, named Djixion. All of  
them were listening to Fox' hipnotic story as intently as she was.  
  
It was an incredible coincidence to meat Fox here. *Not  
really,* Dana thought. This was after all the second time she  
heard the story -- the first time was a few weeks ago. She had  
been in a space bar and hotel; it just hung there in the middle of  
interstellar space. There she had picked up the name Fox William  
Mulder being bandied about in conversation at the closest table.  
Her interest had peaked and she had, not surprisingly, lost all  
interest in the sexy . . . whatever the sex of the person had  
been. She sauntered over to the table and asked if she had heard  
the name correctly. The storyteller nodded. For a moment she had  
had fantasies of her Fox, somehow transcending more than twenty-  
three hundred years of time. For a moment the possibility of a  
never mentioned time travel adventure had entered her mind.  
Catching her breath she asked what he knew about Fox Mulder. When  
the storyteller described a hybrid man, with at least some Human,  
probably some Orion, and possibly Bolian -- or at least one blue-  
skinned and pink-skinned race -- that fantasy had evaporated  
quickly. Dana, however, had become determined to find out who this  
man, who held the familiar name was, and why he had knowledge of  
events dating back twenty-three hundred years. Still, it was a big  
coincidence that she heard the name Fox Mulder mentioned at all.  
  
The planet was a paradise of primal beauty untouched by  
technology. It was marketed by its Ferengi owners as the 'true  
camping experience'. Campers paid through the nose making its  
owners rich. Which was exactly how the Ferengi liked it.  
  
Dana had arrived at the station orbiting the planet two days  
after Fox did, bribing the Ferengi into letting her go to the  
surface. The quota for the maximum number of campers was reached.  
A large sum of money and a little oo-mox was needed as persuasion.  
In keeping with the planets weapons regulations Dana had elected  
to take a bow and arrows with her along with her sword. Marketed  
as the 'ultimate camping and survival experience, where you can  
find tranquillity and peace as well as your own death if you're  
not careful', the Ferengi allowed only knives, swords, axes,  
spears, and bows and arrows to the planet. People were beamed down  
with limited food and water. They were expected to hunt or pluck  
their own food and find their own water. The number of campers was  
limited, so animals couldn't be hunted into extinction.  
  
It had taken Dana two days to find Fox and Diari Mulder, two  
days she had thoroughly enjoyed. She found them together with some  
other campers around a fire and joined them. Not long after Fox  
had proposed that each camper tell a story. They had all agreed,  
and since it had been his idea he had agreed to begin.  
  
Fox told the legend of his name-sake. A legend carried down  
through the Mulder family of a man who, togther with his partner,  
Tara Kelly, stopped an alien invasion of Earth. Dana grinned.  
Although her name been changed her part in the story had managed  
to survive the passage through time. Since Dana had heard the  
story before she was not surprised that their struggles made up a  
rather short part of the story. The present day Fox soon  
progressed into the story of the Mulder family guardian angel, the  
very same Tara Kelly, who transcended death in order to guard the  
Mulder family. Dana grinned again, she really had tried to keep  
tabs on Mulder's descendants, and had protected them when she  
could. The present day Fox' line of the family had apparently  
managed to slip through her notice somehow.  
  
" . . . and so ends the legend of the Mulder guardian angel,"  
Fox said, smiling as he heard murmurs and claps of approval.  
  
"My turn," Frianne purred. "This is a legend among our people.  
Nobody really knows how much of it is true. It was in the early  
days of our exploration of the universe that . . . "  
  
Frianne made herself comfortable by lying on her side. Dressed  
in only the flimsiest excuses for clothing, she curved her body  
enticing everybody present. She archer her back gently, leaned on  
her left arm, allowing everybody a nice view of her cleavage. The  
tiny, loose skirt she was wearing barely covered her curvy bottom  
and allowed glimpses of the paradise beneath. Jaws dropped in  
admiration. Diari gave Fox a scowl. He gave his wife a guilty  
smile and proceeded to closed his mouth, as Diari turned to scowl  
at Frianne. Frianne gave Fox a predatory gaze just to piss Diari  
off. The other men were not so restrained:; the Orion licked his  
lips while the Tinry openly drooled at Frianne, which - aroused  
or not - was not all that strange for a Tinry and Djixion touched  
the tips of his fangs with his tongue one by one. Frianne's dark  
blue-green skin was glistening with sweat in the pale light of the  
planet's three moons. Her arousal was clear. Loaded with  
pheromones the sweat smelled musky and sweet. It enthralled  
everyone. She licked her lips during her tale, her gaze lingering  
the drooling Din, undoubtly deciding on whether she would have sex  
with him tonight, or the day after. She then gazed at Dana, who  
had her mouth slightly ajar but closed it quickly under the  
scrutiny. Frianne smirked and Danna grinned back. Frianne, looked  
around the group deciding on whether she would fuck one, a few of  
them, or whether she would just initiate group sex with them all.  
  
So powerful was a Driak's sex drive, it made Orion slave-girls  
look like nuns. Unlike the Orions though, the Driak were anything  
but submissive. They were down right sexual predators. Thousands  
of years ago an asteroid crashed on their planet and wiped out  
their civilization, a civilization equal to that of Earth's Middle  
Ages. As the women were considerably weaker than the males, far  
fewer women managed to survive. In order for the race to survive  
there was but one option, to have as many children as possible  
with as many different men as possible. Women with higher sex  
drive, independence and strong physiology became the preferred  
choice of the men and evolution took its course. Its result: Driak  
women with an enhanced sex drive, the strength and agility of a  
cat and the twisting ability of a snake. The retractable claws was  
a remanent of the Driak's feline ancestry. Unlike most felines  
though the only place where hair grew on a Driak's body was on  
their heads, which had a lion-like mane quality to them, the color  
ranging from rose-red to the orange color you see on many cats.  
  
The premise of Frianne's story was rather simple. A group of  
Driaks out to explore the galaxy found a civilization at about the  
same technological level. While on their planet, one of the  
females got kidnapped by one of the local animals, who -- as time  
would tell -- was attracted to the Driak female's unusually high  
pheromone count. For two days the female was raped by the animal.  
Frianne described in explicit detail the rape. The Driak female,  
the way Frianne told it, had enjoyed the sex, despite being scared  
to death. Finally a chivalrous knight of the native people had  
slain the beast and rescued her.  
  
That the female had enjoyed the bestiality was not unexpected;  
a recent questionnaire revealed that seventy-nine percent of the  
Driak females enjoyed bestiality on a regular basis, thirteen  
percent had had bestiality but did not practice it regularly, six  
percent had not had bestiality yet, but was planning on  
experiencing it in the near future, and only two percent had some  
resemblance of decorum by the definition of other races, not that  
that stopped them from having sex with almost anyone and anything  
else that crossed their paths.  
  
The outcome had, however, been common knowledge, to such an  
agree that someone a few centuries ago had said, 'Driak women fuck  
anything that walks.' A Driak woman present had promptly answered,  
'Correction. We fuck anything that lives.' This had soon evolved  
into the Driak people's personal motto. The other rather  
interesting outcome was the average number of sex partners for  
Driak women in their one hundred and twenty-year life span: twenty  
thousand. The lower border was two thousand, the upper border  
forty thousand. This too was common knowledge and had prompted  
someone to say, 'Girls just want to have fun . . . and a Driak  
girl's definition of fun is sex.' The Driaks had been particularly  
proud of those outcomes. The natural average number of children  
for a Driak woman as biologists and historians say was thirty-two.  
Lucky for everybody else in the universe they started to use birth  
control a long time ago, or they would have run everybody else  
over.  
  
Frianne continued her story with detailed descriptions of the  
sex the Driak female had given her knight in shining armor as  
thanks. Sadly the female had overestimated his sexual prowess and  
after two days of continues sex, he had slipped into a coma,  
brought on by exhaustion and dehydration that lasted six months -   
apparently her vaginal fluids did not contain enough water for him  
to live on.  
  
This sparked a surge of paranoia on the planet The people  
declared war on the Driaks. The Driaks decided that the best way  
to end a war was he way it began. Captured soldiers were given a  
royal sexual treatment before they were sent home unharmed. A few  
days before the hero had woken up, his people had understood the  
message and had initiated peace talks. Frianne finished her story  
with detailed descriptions of -- not all that surprisingly -- the  
orgy between the two governments that the Driak government had  
organized in celebration.  
  
By the time Frianne finished, Diari and Fox were kissing  
passionately, and the three men were advancing on Frianne.  
  
"Uh-uh, I've found that making desperate men wait a little  
longer, the sex gets infinitely better," Frianne said, wiggling  
her finger and licking her lips.  
  
Fox and Driari parted reluctantly, while the men settled back  
down with difficulty.  
  
"Well," Djixion said, "I guess it's my turn. I will tell you a  
legend of my people. An ancient legend. Historians say that it's  
at least sixteen hundred years old, and probably older. It's the  
legend of 'The Angel's Sacrifice'."  
  
Djixion's race, the Leln, came from sector 221-G and had a  
rather infamous history. About fifteen hundred years ago their  
advanced civilization was wiped by the Enevians, who originated  
from the same sector. The Leln were one of the first races that  
befell the fate. The Enevians were evil. They believed that they  
were superior to all races and had the right to rule all. For a  
hundred and fifty years the Enevians ruled sector 221-G with an  
iron fist. Then, four hundred and fifty years ago, they made the  
mistake of declaring war on the Federation. The Enevians  
miscalculated. As the Prime Directive did not apply to races the  
Federation was at war with, the Federation smuggled weapons to the  
subjugated races of sector 221-G. The war had been over within a  
year. The Enevians were vulnerable against attacks from withing  
their sector. With their supply lines in shambles they didn't  
stand a chance. The war had ended within a year, it didn't even  
come anywhere near close to the destructiveness of the Galaxy wide  
Borg War.  
  
After the Enevians' capitulation, peace talks started between  
the Federation, the former subjugated races and the Enevians. The  
Leln, not satisfied with just victory, engineered a deadly disease  
that would kill only Enevians. It had no initial symptoms, an  
incubation period of two years and was extremely contagious. Two  
years and three months later there wasn't an Enevian left alive  
anywhere.  
  
The thousand years of living in primitive conditions and under  
subjugation had apparently changed the real life events of  
Djixion's story to the stuff of legends, for it involved dragons,  
demons and an angel that battled them across the galaxy. The angel  
sacrificed herself by letting a demon inhabit her body, a demon  
she was not sure she could banish from her, once it was inside. Tt  
was the only way to save all the mortals. The angel, Djixion  
stated, could simply have stood by and watch the mortals die. It  
would never have meant her death, but she made the sacrifice, beat  
the demon, and saved everybody inside the galaxy.  
  
Dana grinned at the story, while the arousal, brought on by  
Frianne and her story, slowly ebbed away. *This is too good to be  
true,* Dana thought as a way to truly baffle the group entered her  
mind. She soon realised it was too good to be true, since it  
required her to give up the group sex that was sure to be coming.  
She consoled herself with the knowledge that Frianne would hunt  
her down later, because, Dana knew, she would never be able to  
tear herself away from the prospect of a sex partner over twenty-  
three hundred years old. Dana also decided to let herself get  
caught.  
  
"And that is how the Angel's Sacrifice saved us all," finished  
Djixion. The enthralled audience clapped in appreciation.  
  
"That is of course not what truly happened," Dana said with an  
enigmatic smile.  
  
"The blonde talks," Frianne answered, licking her lips  
suggestively, "for a moment I started thinking there was something  
to the Humans' claims of 'dumb blondes'."  
  
Dana's comment irritated Djixion. As he threw a another piece  
of burnable material on the fire, he said, "That suggests you know  
what truly happened."  
  
"I do. Would you like me to tell?" Dana asked with a mysterious  
smile. The group nodded.  
  
"First, I would have to paint the canvas with a background,"  
Dana said thoughtful. "There was a man, a Thallonian, a general.  
His name was Thul and he was madly in love with a princess; the  
sister of the Thallonian Emperor. The power that went with the  
princess was the main reason for his love. The princess loved him  
as much as he loved her, however, his stature was not enough, he  
was born a common man, and the Emperor did not give permission for  
the marriage.  
  
"Now this could have broken many men, sink them into  
depression. But not Thul, no Thul was made of sturdier stuff; he  
decided to fight for his love, he decided to make such an enormous  
act of vision and gain such power, that the Emperor would not be  
able to afford not to allow him to marry his sister. His plan  
required a lot of innocent deaths and lots of unnecessary  
destruction. There was however a Federation ship present that  
thwarted his plans, in the process Thul's bastard son died and the  
Thallonian authorities threw him in prison. Thul vowed vengeance  
for the death of his son and inability to marry his beloved one.  
The princess, still in love with Thul, hired someone to free him  
from his prison . . .  
  
*****  
  
Thul sat in his cell, sulking. He didn't have much else to do.  
Suddenly the force field that held him dropped then came back up  
again. A pair of glasses, headphones and a microphone seemed to  
materialize out of thin air and flew at him. He caught them, and  
put on the glasses. With them on he saw a man standing inside his  
cell. The man was dressed in a black robe, with a hood that  
concealed his face perfectly. It was as if the man had only a  
shadow where a head should be. The man pointed at his ears.  
  
Thul understood and put on the headphones and microphone  
combination.  
  
"Good," said the voice in Thul's ear piece. Thul watched as the  
man removed a rather large device from inside his robes and threw  
it at him. "Put this on your upper arm and activate it. Hurry up,  
it won't take the guards long to figure out, that what they're  
seeing is not what's actually happening. By the way, I was hired  
by the princess to get you out," said the invisible man.  
  
Thul turned the device -- that covered most of his upper arm --  
on. He saw a little flicker go over his body and then nothing.  
  
"Follow me," said the voice in his ears. The force field  
flickered as Thul stepped through.  
  
"Who are you anyway?" Thul asked.  
  
"My identity is irrelevant," the man answered as they walked  
through the corridors. Thul nodded. In his self-possessed mind he  
didn't consider the man's identity relevant either, so Thul just  
kept following him. After a few minutes, guards started filtering  
through entrances, each shouting about the escaped prisoner. It  
took a little effort to make sure the guards did not bump into  
them, but they walked out the prison rather easily.  
  
Once outside the effects of the transporter scrambler, the man  
said, "Beam us up."  
  
Thul materialized on a dark ship with green walls of unknown  
design. The hooded figure reached insides his robes, there was a  
flicker. A moment later he removed a device similar to the one on  
Thul's upper arm. He put it in a locker along with his headphones  
and microphones. He then gestured to Thul. Thul nodded his  
understanding and proceeded to turn off the arm device. He  
returned it, the headphones and the microphone to the robed man.  
  
The man took them, put them away. "So," said the man's  
seemingly disembodied voice as he turned to face Thul. "I hear you  
want revenge on the Federation for killing your son."  
  
*****  
  
"Thul's plan for revenge was simple: create a virus that will  
destroy every sentient life in the Federation and release it,"  
Dana said, looking around the group. "The execution a little less  
so. He needed a combined effort of several of the biggest crime  
lords, of course after promising they'd get to rule the whole of  
the space that was up until then known as the United Federation of  
Planets, they were more than eager to chip in.  
  
"He had a massive station built, easily the size of small moon,  
from which he could coordinate the effort to destroy the  
Federation and to design the virus. The Romulans delivered to him  
the cloaking device that would conceal his station.  
  
"First of course he had to test his scientists' creation. His  
first test was on a planet called Archaria III. A colony world,  
colonized by Terrans and Peladians. A world filled with the  
beginnings of race hatred, and hatred against hybrids. The virus  
attacked only hybrids fueling more hatred, while everybody accused  
each other. The Enterprise D was dispatched there at the time, and  
her chief medical officer managed to develop a cure.  
  
"The second test was on the Cardassian station in orbit around  
Bajor called Terok Nor, the station that would later be known as  
Deep Space Nine. The test was during the latter days of the  
Cardassian occupation of the planet, an easy place to introduce a  
virus that promised the death of every Cardassian. It however also  
promised the death of every Bajoran, something that was neglected  
to mention to the Bajorans. A Federation doctor by the name of  
Pulaski was sent, after the resident Bajoran doctor, Pulaski's ex-  
husband, asked for help. They, together with the resident  
Cardassian doctor managed to cure this decease as well.  
  
"The third test was done on the Romulan royal family.  
Ambassador Spock -- present there to work for reunification of the  
Romulan and Vulcan peoples -- and an old shipmate and famous  
doctor, Leonard McCoy, managed to find a cure for this virus as  
well, after locating the only -- and banished -- member of the  
Romulan royal family that was not infected.  
  
"The fourth and last test was held in the demilitarized zone  
between the Cardassian Empire and the Federation. The Macquis -- a  
rebel group of ex-Federation citizens, that was fighting the  
Cardassians for their rights and freedom. They did everything in  
their power to stop the virus from wiping out the population of  
the planet on which the test was held. They failed, and the  
Cardassians had decided to vaporize the entire surface of the  
planet to make sure the virus didn't spread. Thul, happy with the  
outcome and not wanting anyone to get a hand on the virus to  
develop a cure, destroyed the virus.  
  
"Finally Thul was ready to release the virus for real. With an  
ingenious plot, he planned to release a computer virus into the  
Federation network, which would order all the replicators to start  
replicating the prionic components which would react together to  
form the deadly virus. Two undercover agents -- Captain Mackenzie  
Calhoun of the starship Excalibur and Captain Jean-Luc Picard of  
the starship Enterprise -- were sent in by the Federation to stop  
Thul and his criminal organization. They succeeded, destroying  
Thul's space station and the man himself in the process.  
  
"Little did the Federation and Thul know, that he was nothing  
more but a pawn in a grander scheme. A scheme of, you guessed it,  
our robed friend.  
  
*****  
  
Diego Rivadeneira, which is the name of our robed figure,  
looked at the view screen of his cloaked vessel, which showed the  
exploding space station, with an invisible grin.  
  
"Plan A," he said, a deadly tone to his voice, "we help Thul  
realise his goal and he succeeds, with the Federation gone there's  
no one to stop us from releasing an even deadlier virus, which  
will clear the quadrant so we can rule it." His crew grinned and  
chuckled evilly. *Fools,* Diego thought.  
  
Diego watched as a small craft managed to get away from the  
explosion in time, and targeted another, bigger, craft. After  
about a minute the bigger craft moved off at warp speed. The  
smaller one just hung there dead in space. Diego checked his  
sensor read out and noticed that its energy reserves were gone.  
His sensors also told him that a big ship was heading this way at  
high warp and would soon arrive. A minute later it dropped out of  
warp, saved the people on board the small craft and then, after  
doing a sensor sweep, moved off at warp.  
  
"Plan B, Thul fails, and with the Federation not doing anything  
because they think they've defeated the man behind the plot, and  
those that worked for him have scattered back to what they always  
do, there is no one to stop us from releasing an even deadlier  
virus," Diego said relaxed, and looked around his bridge and his  
crew with an invisible grin. "Everything just went according to  
plan B." Then he started an eerie, evil laugh that echoed through  
his bridge. His crew joined in.  
  
*****  
  
Dana looked around the group with a grin. They were all focused  
on her, listening intently.  
  
"Now that you know the background, I can go on with the story.  
It happened in the Terran year 2376. For you who don't know, that  
would be around Stardate 53500, for you who don't now Federation  
Stardates either, it happened around two thousand years ago, the  
year following the Dominion War," Dana said smiling, looking at  
any reactions from them.  
  
"The story is about a woman named Dana Katherine Scully. At the  
time she was a Federation Ambassador and had just renegotiated a  
trade agreement on Rania III. Now Dana Katherine Scully was  
special. She is of race of beings that cannot die unless you cut  
off their heads. There are legends about them, spanning back  
thousands of years . . . even at the time the story takes place.  
They are called, not very originally Immortals. People have seen  
them as demons, angels and gods. Some say that they came from the  
dawn of time, that they move silently down through the centuries,  
living many secret lives. You would never recognize what they are,  
unless you see them come back from the dead. One of us could even  
be one, and he . . . or she could be laughing at us right now.  
There even have been those, who claimed that the Immortals  
struggle in an eternal battle that spans eons of time, and that in  
the end, the last Immortal will be God . . . and rule the  
universe."  
  
"Don't take their word for it though, they could be horribly  
wrong," Dana said. She grinned and again picked up the thread of  
her story. "But that is another story . . . as I was saying;  
Rania III."  
  
~~X~~ Chapter One: The Virus  
  
Rania III  
August, 2376  
  
Ambassador Dana Katherine Scully had just successfully diffused  
a potentially volatile situation, the trade-dispute between Rania  
III and Andoria might well have turned nasty. She and her  
entourage were walking across the spaceport towards the  
Ambassadorial star ship. It was small, maneuverable with enough  
fire power and enough speed to escape a bad situation.  
  
The spaceport was bathed in sunlight. Slowly little white  
clouds moved across the green-blue sky. In the bright light the  
beige spaceport seemed to radiate light.  
  
Dana neared the ramp leading into the ship; the posted colony  
guards came to attention. Their blue uniforms gleamed in the  
sunlight. Suddenly the Andorian guard on Dana's right, started to  
cough and clutched his chest. A few seconds later he dropped to  
his knees gasping for breath.  
  
Dana and her entourage were too surprised to act immediately,  
but a moment later Dana sprang to action. With quick strides she  
walked to the gasping guard, who was lying on his side shivering  
wildly, and took off his helmet.  
  
"What's wrong with him?" the other guard, a Human, asked. More  
than a little concern laced his voice.  
  
"I don't know yet," Dana answered. She looked at the shaking,  
sweat covered Andorian, as one of her aides ran a tricorder over  
him.  
  
"Ambassador," said another assistant.  
  
"Yes, Rianne," Dana answered.  
  
"The pilot just informed me, that he was told this planet was  
put under quarantine seven minutes ago, we're not allowed to  
leave." She and Dana watched with horror as spots started to form  
on the Andorian. The spots were more than just spots. I a  
different language, ranging from Klingon to English, from Romulan  
to Ferengi the spots spelt out the same thing; 'Smile, you're  
dead.'  
  
"Jesus Christ!" Dana exclaimed in horror as she read the  
messages. She activated the universal commbadge on her right wrist  
and said, "Emergency medical channel."  
  
Instead of the helpful face that Dana was expecting there was a  
voice recording, "All emergency channels, transporters and  
ambulances are currently overloaded. We know of the epidemic. If  
you have a patients with certain indistinguishable symptoms,  
please bring the patient to the nearest hospital yourself."  
  
"What the . . .?" Dana exclaimed in shock, but quickly changed  
tactics. "You!" she said to the sick man's partner. "Where's the  
nearest hospital?"  
  
*****  
  
Dana, her patient and her entourage arrived at the hospital  
twenty minutes later, after worming themselves a way through a  
seemingly city-wide traffic jam.  
  
"Who's the doctor in charge?" Dana asked a nurse in the  
overcrowded lobby.  
  
"Listen, lady . . ." the aggravated nurse started.  
  
With her right hand, Dana grabbed him by the collar, pulled the  
nurse's face close to her and hissed, "No! You listen, I have some  
virology expertise, I might be able to help find a cure if you  
point me to the person in charge."  
  
The man nodded and yelled to a female colleague, "I'm away for  
a minute, I'm bringing her to the virology center."  
  
"You help out as best as you can," Dana said to her assistants,  
who nodded their ascents as she started to follow the man.  
  
Minutes later, after following the man through a winding set of  
corridors -- each filled with patients lying on the floor and  
nurses and doctors trying to give them relief -- they arrived at  
the virology center. Her reluctant guide pointed at the door then  
turned around and left.  
  
Dana walked through the door leading into the virology center  
and looked around. The pale green walls adorned with white tiles  
gave the room an air of doomed tranquility. The activity in the  
room was anything but tranquil. Doctors and assistants crowded it.  
They walked back and forth between the state of the art equipment,  
talking heatedly as they tried to come up with a cure. Subspace  
scanners, microscopes, quantum-resonance scanners and other  
devices hummed with activity. A large table in the middle, with  
two doctors standing by it, was covered with notes, most stored in  
PADDs, but some hastily scribbled on large pieces of paper: quick  
preliminary sketches and formulas. Crumpled up pieces of paper  
lined the floor. A doctor, most likely the head of the center,  
pointed things out on the large main computer screen. Two doctors  
standing at the table nodded at his comments then turned and  
continued their work.  
  
"Who are you and what are you doing here?" said the man at the  
screen as she approached him.  
  
"Dana Scully, I might be able to help. You got something that  
allows me to catch up?" Dana asked.  
  
The medium built ash blond doctor clearly not liking her  
intrusion, hesitated briefly, before saying, "Sander Schafer.  
Pick up a PADD. File: Double Helix fifth incarnation."  
  
Dana grabbed one of the PADDs on the table and started reading  
through the information rapidly. The incubation period was at  
least nine and a half weeks, according to the blood samples. Ten  
weeks old was the oldest sample of infected blood. Five months ago  
Thul had been stopped, thought Dana. It was big news throughout  
the Federation. How close they had all come to annihilation had  
not been part of the news release. The Question remained, how long  
ago had they, however 'they' were, started to spread this new  
version of the disease.  
  
Chemical notations, DNA profiles, data about the spread of the  
viral outbreak. Now this was interesting. It started here in the  
capital, and was rapidly moving outward. Another twelve hours and  
people would start succumbing everywhere on the planet.  
  
"They screwed up," Dana noted to the head doctor, who was  
working a few meters away from her.  
  
"What do you mean?" said the man without looking up from his  
work. Once in a while he scooped some of his tossled hair back  
over his head.  
  
"The spread, it started here and is moving outward. With an  
incubation time of at least two months I'm certain that whoever  
planned this would have wanted the disease to set in everywhere on  
the planet at roughly the same time. Whoever did the delivery  
screwed it up," Dana elaborated.  
  
"You're right. I better send that tidbit of information to the  
Enterprise as well," Doctor Schafer noted.  
  
"The Enterprise is coming here?" Dana asked.  
  
"After I found that this was the Double Helix virus, I sent  
word to Starfleet Command immediately and recommended any and all  
blood tests they made recently in the fleet. Starfleet said that  
the Enterprise would be dispatched to us immediately," Schafer  
said. He pushed a button and the screen of the computer before him  
changed to a worried looking red head.  
  
Dana half ignored the conversation and focused back on the  
PADD. She felt herself pale with every new tidbit of information:  
it kills within fifteen minutes to twenty-four hours, depending  
mostly on the concentration of the virus in the blood stream, then  
on the species and the strength of the patient's immune system.  
  
Dr. Schafer tapped the communications screen off and returned  
to his work.  
  
"What's this?" Dana asked, pointing to a picture made by a  
microscope of one of the sores.  
  
"Hmm, oh that. We haven't figured that one out yet, best guess  
we came up it's the closest thing to a release valve for the  
virus," Dr. Schafer stated absentmindedly.  
  
Dana knew of viruses that released themselves into the air  
through sores on an patient's body, but this looked nothing like  
them. "But . . . this . . . seems completely wrong for that. This  
is . . . almost as if . . . as if . . . it can open and close . .  
. but still . . . that doesn't account for . . ."  
  
Schafer's eyes widened and an expression of revelation mixed  
with shock lined his face. Dana did not notice it, intent on  
finding the solution to this puzzle her focus was on the PADD.  
"Oh. My. God!" Schafer esclaimed slowly.  
  
"What?" Dana asked. The room had quieted down. She looked  
around and saw everyone's attention focused on Schafer. She turned  
back to him. The large main screen behind him now held the same  
picture as her PADD.  
  
"Computer, test hypothesis: this formation is a release for the  
virus, but unlike a natural viral release, it can open and close,"  
Schafer said heatedly.  
  
"Test complete, main part of formation conforms to hypothesis,"  
said the computer as it highlighted the formation.  
  
"Main part? What could the other parts be?" Schafer asked, his  
voice tinged with astonishment.  
  
As the picture on the screen changed to highlight the other  
parts of the strange formation, the computer answered, "Unknown."  
  
"I doubt the rest would have a totally different purpose than  
the release valve," one of the other doctor's said.  
  
"Computer, assume the rest of the formation is also a release  
system, could it release prions?" Schafer asked his face paling.  
  
"Affirmative," the computer answered.  
  
"Check the four prions that form the virus. Can the system  
release these four prions?" Derrrick asked with a sense of doom in  
his voice.  
  
"Four out of the six release capillary match the four prions,"  
the computer stated.  
  
"Six release capillaries? There are only four prions that form  
the virus. Why would there be six capillaries?" one of the  
virologists asked, looking intently at the screen.  
  
They all stared at each other for a while, trying to figure out  
the answer. Then some of them started running theories by one of  
their colleagues.  
  
"Computer," Dana asked, reluctantly. "What can open the release  
valve?"  
  
"Two possibilities, outside stimulus of a chemical agent, or  
stimulus from inside the body," the computer said.  
  
"Using the scans of the valve, can you extrapolate possible  
chemical agents that could open the valve?" doctor Schafer asked  
with urgency.  
  
"Affirmative," the computer once again stated.  
  
"Do it, and display them, include graphical notations."  
  
"Working . . . Working . . . Direct contact with these agents  
could open the valve," the computer stated. A list of compounds  
appeared on the main screen.  
  
"Leave only those to which the valve is most sensitive to," Dr.  
Schafer said quickly.  
  
"Affirmative," the computer stated. The list shortened  
noticably.  
  
"Now, can any of the remaining agents be formed by coupling two  
prions, who fit the remaining two release capillaries?" Schafer  
asked, dread filling his voice.  
  
"Working . . . affirmative," the computer said, only one  
compound remained. Its graphical representation became highlighted  
then animated. The animation showed it breaking up into two  
smaller compounds.  
  
Sander Schafer pulled a chair from under the main table, and  
sat down heavily in it muttering, "Jesus Christ."  
  
Similar mutters came from everybody else, nobody needed to  
explain it to them. "This virus wasn't made to destroy the  
Federation, it was made to kill every living eukaryotic life form  
in the galaxy," Schafer stated out loud. "Whoever created this  
thing must be completely insane. Unless he has a cure, it'll kill  
him as well."  
  
*Or doesn't need to worry about dying.* The thought popped in  
Dana's mind before she could stop it. She shook her head. *You  
don't need to go there,* she told herself. *It's probably just  
some insane mortal, like the last one: Thul.* But the would not  
completely leave her alone.  
  
Everybody stood there for a moment, then Schafer stood up and  
with renewed vigor he said, "Move it, people. We might be the only  
chance the galaxy has, we must find a cure." The staff went back  
to work with a flourish, each determined to find a cure as fast as  
possible.  
  
Dana grabbed a sample of infected blood and walked to one of  
the few unoccupied scanners and placed it under the viewer. "What  
the hell?" she muttered confused. The blood was virus free. She  
turned back towards the table and picked up a tricorder. After  
verifying that she indeed had virus free blood, she used it to  
find a blood sample that contained the virus. She placed this  
sample under the viewer. Once more the scanner showed the sample  
to be virus free.  
  
"This is impossible," Dana said, rechecking the sample with the  
tricorder. It showed no signs of the virus. "How . . ." Dana  
stared but stopped as she had an epiphany. She picked up a closed  
vial with infected blood and checked it with the tricorder; all of  
the virus and all of the prions were concentrated as far away from  
her hand and body as possible. The virus was built to react to her  
Quickening, a simple magnetic repulsion effect, to make sure make  
sure no Immortal ever got infected and accidentally created a  
cure. Whoever created the virus knew about Immortals, a Watcher?  
*Or doesn't need to worry about dying.* The thought returned to  
her. A Watcher didn't really make sense, why would he want to kill  
himself, but an Immortal . . . One of their own had created this  
virus, to kill off every mortal life form in the galaxy. But why?  
He had to be insane.  
  
Suddenly Dana knew what she had to do. She looked at the door  
in the back, most likely a private office, then at Schafer. She  
saw him take a vial out of a machine triumphantly, as she walked  
to him and asked, pointing at the door in the back, "That your  
office?"  
  
"Yeah, why?"  
  
"Does it have a quarantine unit in there?" Dana asked,  
switching her weight from foot to foot in apprehension.  
  
"Yes," Schafer said, frowning at her strange questioning.  
  
"Force field or old fashioned doors?" Dana asked him again.  
  
"We've got state of the art equipment, but it's an old  
building. It's still got doors," Schafer said, looking at her  
strangely.  
  
"That the virus?" Dana asked pointing at the vial that Schafer  
was holding.  
  
For a moment Dr. Schafer forgot about her strange line of  
questioning and held up the vial proudly, shaking the clear liquid  
inside it. "Yep, we just managed to synthesize it. First step to  
finding a cure. This stuff is so concentrated, even if you took  
only a part of it, you'd be dead in minutes."  
  
"Good," Dana said and whisked the vial from his hands, turned  
around and walked towards the door. Most of the doctors were to  
wrapped up in their work to notice.  
  
"Hey, give it back!" Schafer said in anger, following her  
through the door to his office.  
  
Dana held up the vial for him to see. Schafer looked and saw  
the liquid all crawled up the side of the vial away from Dana. His  
eyes widened, his mouth open, locked at a position to yell  
obscenities to her.  
  
Instead, "What the . . . ?" came out.  
  
"Close and lock the door, now," Dana said, sternly. Schafer  
complied.  
  
Dana looked around the office. The color of the walls were the  
same as the main lab. A desk stood in the middle with a computer  
on it. Medical scanners and other equipment laid on tables that  
lined the walls. A door in the far left corner of the office  
undoubtedly lead to the quarantine unit. She grabbed a hypospray  
from the shelf to her right and replaced the empty vial it was  
holding with the one containing the virus.  
  
"What do you think you're doing, we need that to generate a . .  
." Schafer was too late. He watched in horror he as Dana injected  
the virus into her right arm. Relief washed over him as she handed  
the half empty sprayer back to him. She winced as her arms began  
to discolor.  
  
Dana took her katana from within her purple Ambassadorial robes  
and said, as she cut open her left hand. "Normally I wouldn't tell  
you, but I don't think I have much of a choice, I just have to  
hope you keep my secret." She held up her hand for him to see it  
healing up. "I am four hundred plus years old and I am Immortal. I  
generate a relatively powerful bio-electric field. You saw it; the  
virus and the prions were engineered so my bio-electric field  
would repulse them, to make sure . . ." Dana groaned in pain and  
decided it was best to get herself into the quarantine unit.  
Staggering along, she continued, "my immune-system, and that of  
others like me, doesn't generate a cure for the disease."  
  
"Don't tell them," Dana said pointed at the wall, behind which  
the others were working. "Don't tell anyone." Dana staggered and  
Dr. Schafer grabbed her arm to steady her and helped her into the  
quarantine unit.  
  
Once she was inside he locked the doors. He pushed the intercom  
button and said to Dana's kneeled form, "Your intercom button is  
to your right."  
  
While pain lanced through her body, she pulled herself up with  
extreme effort. She groaned, screamed and cursed. She pushed the  
button while leaning to the wall. "I think . . . my immune system  
. . . is our best hope. You . . . keep . . . ngggh . . . working  
there . . . while my body . . . arghh . . . does the same here . .  
. "  
  
Schafer turned away. He had seen the last stage of the virus  
too often: first the sores would split open, releasing massive  
amounts of blood, then the patient would go into extreme  
convulsions, finally most of the flesh would rupture and internal  
bleeding would occur leading to death. He felt lucky the intercom  
was down, so he wouldn't have to hear her screams.  
  
He turned back to the door, looked through the small window and  
saw the bloodied corpse of Dana Scully. Soaked through with blood  
her once purple robes were now crimson. For a moment he thought he  
had only dreamed her hand healing and that the virus had gotten  
her after all. Then he saw electrical discharges cover her body,  
some blood actually flowing back into her wounds, before those  
wounds closed right in front of his eyes. He looked on in  
astonished as her body to regenerated. Suddenly she gasped for  
breath and slowly stood back up.  
  
"Wow," he muttered. He was envisioning a cure, when he saw  
spots forming the grizzly words once more darkening her face.  
Suddenly he understood the true scope of what she had done. She  
would keep dying in the same horrible manner, until her body  
finally generated the needed anti-bodies.  
  
She staggered towards him, her sweat made red trickles as it  
pulled along the blood on her body. She was a gruesome sight. Red,  
blood-soaked fingers covered with new sores pushed the intercom  
button. "Listen to me! Don't . . . don't ever come in here!  
I'm a perfectly trained killer, and in the states I'm going to be  
in, I might kill you instinctively without so much as a blink of  
an eye! Don't come in here, no matter how dead I look! I might  
not be dead, or wake up before you can get out! Don't even open  
the door, unless you're absolutely certain I've completely  
recovered! Don't be fooled! Aaagh! I might not be thinking with  
all my faculties and just try to get out whatever the cost!  
Nnnggg! Do you understand?"  
  
"Yes," he said and watched her sink to the floor in pain.  
  
"Sander!" an agitated voice called into Shafer's office from  
the lab. "I don't know what you two are doing in there, but if we  
want to find a cure, we need that virus."  
  
"Of course, I'm coming," Schafer said, removing the half-empty  
vial from the hypospray.  
  
Once through the door, he closed and locked it behind him.  
  
"Where's the woman?"  
  
"Inside. None of you go inside, she works alone," Schafer  
answered, his voice solemn.  
  
"What!? But . . ." the man said.  
  
"No buts. She's doing the best she can. Sean, trust me on this.  
It's best to leave her alone and not to go in there," Schafer  
answered. He felt the key in his pocket and felt secure. The age  
of the building was a blessing. No one could command the computer  
to open his door. His key was required. If anyone tried to take  
the key rom him, he could always hide or throw the key away.  
  
*****  
  
Half an hour later  
  
"Let me out!" Dana screamed, while she threw herself against  
the door. Her face seemed like that of a viscous and hurt animal.  
One eye turned up into an eye socket and she screamed in pain.  
  
Schafer saw, rather then heard Dana's scream of agony and rage.  
Schafer pushed the intercom button and said coolly, "You know I  
can't hear you unless you push the intercom button." He kept his  
emotions carefully in check overcoming his first instinct to rush  
in and deliver pain killers. In her condition she would probably  
rip him apart. He could not allow himself to feel any sympathy.  
"Dying, regenerating and waking up again must get you hungry and  
thirsty. There are replicators installed, you know." He said in a  
detached tone.  
  
Suddenly she was upright. Her fist came flying at him.  
Reflexively he took a step back. The fist connected with the  
armored transparent aluminum edge of the window in the door making  
a small star shaped indentation. He stepped forward, looked  
through the window and saw her lying on the floor convulsing and  
spitting up blood. The bones in her hand were completely  
shattered, but he saw it healing already. Once more Schafer saw  
the sores splatter open and spray blood.  
  
It sickened him. If for some cosmic fluke he got his hands on  
the person who created this virus his Hypocratic oath would not  
keep him from killing him. Realizing that he could do no more for  
Dana, he returned to the main lab. He carefully Locked the door  
behind him. They were making progress; finding the cure wasn't the  
problem, finding it on time was. He wiped sweat from his forehead  
with his right hand. He felt ill, his limbs hurt, his head hurt,  
everything hurt. On top of that he was tired, he knew he needed  
rest, he also knew he didn't have time for rest. He looked at his  
wrist as he moved it away from his sweaty forehead. On it he saw  
the familiar discolorations that were the beginnings of the deadly  
sores. He cursed mentally. He was running out of time.  
  
A blue column of energy appeared and a moment later a familiar  
face, wearing a bio-hazard suit materialized. Beverly Crusher,  
chief medical officer of the USS Enterprise looked around, spotted  
him, grimaced at the unpretty picture and walked over.  
  
"The virus has incubated inside of you," she stated the  
obvious.  
  
"Yes, it has. You do know you're not getting off this planet  
even with that suit, unless we find the cure don't you?" Schafer  
asked solemnly.  
  
"Yes," said Beverly, as neutrally as she could manage, "last  
time we spoke, you told me you think whoever distributed this  
virus made mistakes."  
  
"Really? I guess in all the excitement, or should I say shock,  
I forgot to contact you about our new discovery," he answered  
almost in glee.  
  
"What?" Beverly asked hopeful at first. Then she noticed the  
mad undertone.  
  
"Oh, just this," Schafer answered. He walked towards the main  
screen and pushed the buttons needed to show her the information.  
He did not explain, he just let her read.  
  
"My god, this will kill everything in the Galaxy," she  
whispered in shock.  
  
"Yeah, welcome to the Apocalypse," Schafer answered, chuckling  
with mad glee.  
  
"I'm not giving up that easily."  
  
"Have you heard me say anything about giving up?" he asked,  
grinning even wider.  
  
Beverly looked at him as if he was mad, "I don't get it. Not  
what you're saying and not what so funny."  
  
"Something that occurred to me while I was standing there  
looking at you materialize. Don't you see the irony of it all? The  
genius of the creator of this virus, insane but a genius? I mean,  
look at us," he pointed around the room with hard working doctors,  
some of whom were looking at him with a strange expression. "One  
of his cronies messed up, and it's allowing us find a cure. We  
already have the virus synthesized, it's only a matter of time.  
But you know what, even if we do find the cure in time, the virus  
is so infectious and so wide spread already that we simply don't  
have enough hyposprays, syringes and personnel in the whole  
Federation to inoculate even one planet, let alone the billions  
across the Federation and the trillions more across the galaxy.  
And I've got European ancestry, I mean the billion that comes  
after milliard and the trillion that comes after billiard." He  
laughed a good, mad laugh, before finishing his speech. "The only  
hope we've got is saving enough and the most important people of  
every race in the Federation and a planet uninfected for them to  
live on... and hopefully in about a few thousand years we'll have  
rebuilt the Federation."  
  
Beverly looked at him, tried to find a flaw in his reasoning  
and could not. Her face whitened at her conclusion.  
  
"Well, there's one good thing that comes from all of this,"  
Schafer said with a grin. Like his mother had told him over and  
over, 'Every disadvantage has an advantage, everything bad, has  
something good inside of it. If you'll just look long enough,  
you'll find it.'  
  
"Something good?" Dr. Crusher asked him disbelieving.  
  
"Yeah, this will probably kill off the Borg, as well," Shafer  
said and laughed heartily. The mad undertone was gone. "Ironic,  
isn't it? The biggest threat to the Federation getting eliminated  
by an even bigger threat, yet some of us survive."  
  
A few of the other doctors started laughing, as exhaustion got  
to them. "Good one, Schafe. We needed that," Sean called in  
between laughs.  
  
"No problem," Dr. Schafer called back. He returned to his work.  
Then he thought of something and picked up a medical tricorder.  
  
"I'll have to relay your discovery to the Captain and then to  
Starfleet. Our best bet is setting up a network with every  
virologist in the Federation and work on this together," Beverly  
said, dread lacing her voice. She looked back at Schafer and saw  
him frown as he waved the scanning device of a medical tricorder  
over her.  
  
"What is it?" Beverly asked flatly. She had an idea of what was  
to coming, but she didn't want to think about it, the implications  
were too horrible.  
  
"You can take off your bio-hazard suit; it'll only hamper your  
abilities," Dr. Schafer said calmly, too calmly.  
  
"This virus can't pass through this suit . . ." Beverly was  
shocked. Her worst fears were coming true.  
  
"Exactly. Which means you were infected, before you were beamed  
down," Sander answered her, as he turned back to his work station.  
  
Beverly took off the bio-hazard suit, revealing a black and  
grey Starfleet uniform. The blue line on the uniforms sleeve and  
the blue collar of the sweater identified her as part of  
Starfleet's medical and science staff. With resignation she walked  
toward the communications console and pushed a few buttons. Nurse  
Ogawa appeared on the small screen. She noticed Beverly's lack of  
bio-suit and her eyes widened in shock, but said nothing.  
  
"Alyssa, check everybody in sickbay for the virus, then have  
the computer check everybody else on board. I'm uploading the  
exact specifications of the virus, now," Beverly said with  
urgency. She already knew the outcome, but she had to run the  
test, hoping against hope.  
  
"Yes, doctor," Alyssa answered a little frightened.  
  
Beverly waited impatient. She leaned on the console, and tapped  
the surface with her right hand. After a few minutes Nurse Ogawa's  
face returned to the screen. "Doctor . . . we're all infected."  
  
"Alyssa, set up a connection with the lab here and be ready to  
add connections with almost every other doctor and virologist in  
the Federation. They'll soon be joining us," Beverly said,  
practically spitting out the words. "Now connect me with the  
captain, and hurry."  
  
"Yes, doctor," Ogawa answered.  
  
*****  
  
"Doctor, I was just enjoying a nice cup of Earl Grey," said  
Picard to Beverly's visage on his computer screen. Since he  
couldn't really do anything he had decided to leave coordinating  
the quarantine to his first officer and take a break. His smiled  
wavered, when he realized Beverly was not wearing her bio suit.  
  
"Everybody on board the Enterprise has already been infected,"  
Dr. Crusher said, via the screen of the computer.  
  
Picard spit up his tea in surprise. The amber liquid spilled  
across his table as he placed his cup on his desk in haste.  
"What?! How?!"  
  
"A few weeks, perhaps as far back as two to three months ago,"  
Beverly said, while a dark frown crossed her face. "We could have  
picked it up at any of the places we stopped by in that time."  
  
"My god, that means . . ."  
  
"That probably the whole of the Federation is already  
infected," Beverly interrupted him. "This one is different from  
the ones that came before, it spreads. The viruses that came  
before could not reproduce the prions. They would after awhile  
burn out. This one makes sure new prions are being released from  
an infected body. Captain," Beverly said, urgently, while pushing  
a few buttons. Her image shrank somewhat, allowing an animation of  
the internal workings of the sores beside her image. "This is the  
way it works. The smaller vents release the prions. Six in total.  
Four of them form the unincubated virus, the other two form a  
chemical agent that opens the larger vent. The middle vent  
releases the actual virus and it closes almost instantly after  
contact with the chemical agent, needing a new contact to be  
reopened. I'll explain the life cycle of the virus.  
  
"When it enters a new environment there's not enough of the  
chemical agent to keep the large vent open, thus releasing  
virtually nothing of the virus. Doctors will try to help whoever  
is carrying the virus, which will be in a progressed stage. They  
will not have the time to come up with a cure and since nobody  
else got sick and nobody will for months to come, they'll think  
it's either not infectious or cannot attack their species. All the  
while the prions pass through the force fields that are their  
quarantine measurements, combines in the unincubated virus and  
infects people. The virus in this form does nothing but multiply  
and gets the infected body to release more of the prions. In time  
enough of the chemical agent is formed to open the main valve  
almost continuously, which at the time where the virus isn't  
active yet shows no signs of being there. Infection now goes  
rapidly, complete planetary infection can go as fast as two days.  
When the virus finally activates itself and starts consuming the  
body's flesh to release truly massive amounts of itself and the  
prions . . ." Beverly heatedly explained to Picard.  
  
"The first to die are the very doctors that might have been  
able to find a treatment," Picard answered, starting to understand  
the deadliness of the disease.  
  
"Exactly. Jean-Luc, this virus wasn't created to destroy the  
Federation, it was created to kill off every living thing in the  
galaxy. It jumps force fields, spreads incredibly rapidly and  
hitches rides on every ship it can find. The doctors here have  
told me that animals and even plants get infected with this  
disease," Beverly explained. "And since we're already infected, I  
can safely say that a huge part of the Federation will also be  
infected. The virologists here have already found the viruses life  
cycle and synthesized the virus. Finding a cure is not the  
problem, finding it in time is, and I don't know if we can manage.  
And as doctor Schafer realized . . . unless we find a cure that  
can be administered by simply releasing it in a planet's  
atmosphere, we don't have enough personnel to inoculate everyone,  
if we get a hundredth of a percent of the population, we're lucky.  
  
"And that's just the Federation. The Klingons, the Romulans,  
the Ferengi, we can probably send the data for the cure and they  
inoculate themselves, but for the rest of the Galaxy I've got no  
idea. Plus this thing travels as fast as the fastest ship it gets  
on, if the Borg, or another trans warp capable species gets  
infected . . ." Beverly let her statement hang. Picard's  
expression showed her that she did not need to explain any  
further. Gravely she added, "Captain, I think we should start  
looking for a planet that has had no visitation in at least the  
last six months, and start choosing which people from every  
species in the Federation need to be saved . . . so the  
Federation, in time, may rebuilt itself."  
  
"My god," said Picard as he slowly stood up, and stealed  
himself for what he had to do. "I will contact Starfleet and  
explain to them. Picard out." Picard turned off the computer  
screen. Then he took a few steadying breaths and walked onto the  
bridge of the USS Enterprise-E.  
  
"Data, contact Starfleet Headquarters," he ordered.  
  
"That will not be necessary, sir. I am receiving a communique  
from Starfleet right now," Data answered, swiveling his chair to  
face Jean-Luc Picard.  
  
"On screen," Picard said.  
  
"Aye, sir," Data answered.  
  
The large view screen switched from a view of the planet to the  
visage of Admiral Necheyev. Her blonde hair was tossled and sweat  
poured from her head. Red welts were visible where the sores would  
soon be forming.  
  
"Captain Picard," Necheyev said, the strain in her voice  
evident.  
  
"Admiral, I have some disturbing news," Picard said.  
  
"Me too. Captain . . . this virus is not an isolated case. As  
you can see, Earth too is infected. I've got reports of the first  
few thousand patients from Vulcan, Andorra, Betazed and every  
other major planet in the Federation." She paused as she heard the  
gasps across the Enterprise bridge.  
  
"It's worse," Picard answered, grimacing. *Better get this out  
now,* Picard thought. "Everybody on board the Enterprise is  
already infected, which means that most other starship crews and  
starbases will also be infected." The stunned gazes of his command  
staff were almost more than he could bare, but he had not found it  
in himself to tell them in a more private setting.  
  
"Let me up the ante then, Captain," Admiral Necheyev answered  
through the screen with a grim smile. "We've gotten reports about  
infections from the Klingons. So too from the Romulans, the  
Ferengi, the Cardassians, and they are so busy rebuilding their  
ruins that they don't have the ability to find a cure. Reports  
from Sector 221-G about the virus there and even the Breen.  
They're normally rather seclusive, but they saw it fit to promise  
us, and probably everybody else as well, that if they find out we  
gave them the disease they'd make sure to bring us down with them.  
We answered them we were dying from the same virus as they were."  
  
"Sorry, to disappoint you, Admiral, but it seems I'll be the  
one winning this little one-upmanship," Picard answered, walking a  
little closer to the screen, with an even grimmer smile. "Dr.  
Crusher just explained to me that this virus won't burn itself out  
like the previous versions. This one will spread out. This virus  
is created to wipe out every living thing in the galaxy. And  
unless they manage to develop a cure that can be spread simply by  
releasing it in the atmosphere of a planet, only a fraction of  
everyone will survive, whether they find a cure or not."  
  
"It does seem you win, Captain," Necheyev answered, her voice  
sounded like she was in perpetual pain. Picard found himself  
feeling bad, just bad, not bad for someone or something, just  
plain bad. Even the normally soothing tones of the computers  
working on his bridge, nor the feeling of his great ship working  
up energy to do whatever he commanded, not even the sensation of  
his trusted crew around him could quell the feeling. The pit of  
his stomach seemed to turn inside and out. He could see no hope,  
not for him or anyone else. The sight of the normally as tough as  
nails admiral ready to keel over in pain rattled him, and he knew  
things would get far worse for her. Never had Picard felt so  
hopelessly helpless. Not even the Borg had managed to make him  
feel this overwhelmingly useless. Against the Borg he had  
prevailed, fought himself free of their influence. Against this  
disease, an unseen insidious enemy even now working to eat him  
from the inside out, there was nothing he could do.  
  
"Admiral, Dr. Crusher informed me, that we should start  
selecting a planet which did not have any visitations in at least  
the last six months, then decide who to inoculate when and if they  
find a cure and relocate them to that planet," Picard said almost  
softly, still overwhelmed by the idea.  
  
"Agreed," the admiral answered, then someone off screen handed  
her a PADD.  
  
"It seems the specialized network has been established, I've  
got a projection," Necheyev said, punching a few buttons. Half of  
the screen of the Enterprise changed to show the galaxy. A red  
dot, starting at the Alpha Quadrant started growing outward,  
showing the spread of the disease. "Ten years, twenty, thirty,  
forty, fifty, sixty years," Necheyev needlessly added gravely, the  
whole galaxy was covered in red. "This is if the virus crosses the  
wormhole at DS9." The picture now showed two red dots growing  
outward, covering the galaxy in only twenty years. "This is  
providing the speed of the ships the virus travels on never  
exceeds conventional warp speeds." Gasps of horror followed by a  
deadly silence came from the bridge crew of the Enterprise.  
  
"Captain, I'll return shortly to you with the list of people  
who will be inoculate. You're going to be busy ferrying people to  
the planet we'll have chosen the minute they come up with a cure.  
Necheyev out," the admiral closed the connection.  
  
Picard turned once around, looking everyone of his bridge crew  
in the eyes, trying to convey to them strength and a certainty  
that he didn't feel himself. Troi, of course, felt right through  
it, but gave him an encouraging smile. Then he walked to his  
command chair with a sense of purpose that he didn't feel, and sat  
down. "It seems," he said. "There isn't much else we can do now  
but wait." Chapter Two: The Cure  
  
Schafer locked the door softly behind him, as he stepped back  
into the hub of activity. Dr. Crusher walked up to him with an  
accusing look. Sweat poured from her face. "What's in there?" she  
asked gruffly.  
  
"Nothing that concerns you," he answered her folding his arms  
across his chest. The other doctors turned to look at them. It had  
been several hours since they had a distraction. Then it had been  
Schafer's humorous remark about the demise of the Borg. Three of  
their comrades had to have been wheeled out on a stretcher since  
that time.  
  
"Listen," said Crusher with a pained voice, stopping to cough  
several times. "You've been in there several times over the past  
few hours. If you've got something in there that could possibly  
lead us to a cure, you'll let us to it. If you don't, I'm  
beginning to wonder if you're the one who screwed up the  
distribution."  
  
Schafer grabbed Crusher by the collar and pulled her close,  
with surprising strength for a man who, to Crusher, seemed ready  
to drop dead. The hideous sores covered his body and he constantly  
coughed up blood. "You listen to me. My office contains our  
best, if not our only hope for survival. But like Pandora's Box  
it also contains death and destruction on a scale I'm only just  
beginning to fathom. So neither you, nor anyone else goes in  
there unless I say so, or I fall over. And when I do, you  
better take every precaution you can make, before you go in  
there. Especially taking with you an open mind that can see the  
grand scheme of things. For at the moment, we still have the hope  
of saving several million, perhaps a few hundred million people,  
but if you let out what's in there too early..." Schafer stopped  
talking to make a dramatic pause and to coughed up some more  
blood, before continuing. "No one will survive." Schafer let  
go of the thoroughly intimidated Beverly Crusher, then pulled out  
a handkerchief and used it to clean off the blood from his chin.  
For a moment he looked at the blood, then put it back into one of  
his pockets.  
  
Beverly mustered up as much dignity as she could, and returned  
to work. She did not like it, but there was not much she could do  
about it. She continued with her work, hoping he would fall over  
sooner, rather than later, so she could have a look for herself.  
  
After half an hour of hard work Schafer felt himself growing  
weaker. He decided to check up on Dana one last time, before -- he  
knew for sure - he collapsed.  
  
*****  
  
Dana woke up with pain all over her body. She choked up some  
blood and spit it out. Her clothes were a hideous mess. But she  
knew something was different, which was remarkable to say the  
least since she could barely remember what up or down was, or what  
was before or after, let alone some kind of details out of the  
confusing haze that clouded her mind. She looked around, not  
understanding where, why or even who she was. There was only an  
inkling about her identity that was just beyond her grasp. She got  
up, staggering as she looked around. A table was crashed against  
the far wall. Her eyes followed the wall until she saw the hilt of  
a sword sticking out of a machine mounted in the wall. How or why  
it got there she did not know. But a single clear thought pierced  
the haze in her head, a clear voice that said, *I am Dana  
Katherine Scully and I was borne immortal. I cannot die unless  
someone takes my head -- and with it, my power.*  
  
Mesmerized she walked to the sword and pulled it free,  
revealing a katana. She looked over the edge, letting a finger  
glide along side it. In an instant she felt the blade cut through  
to the bone. She pulled back quickly. Fascinated, she looked on as  
the wound healed rapidly. *Clarity, need clarity!* something  
screamed inside her. She looked at the blade again, and suddenly  
plunged it through her heart. She pulled it free, and collapsed to  
the floor with a grunt.  
  
A minute later she woke, her mind clearer, but still hazy. She  
got up and looked at the sword in her hand. She raised the hilt to  
eye level, the blade pointing down. She was compelled to swivel  
the katana to her side. Without thinking her body followed up with  
the first movements of a kata Duncan MacLeod had drilled into her  
so many years ago. The kata continued, at first with her eyes  
open, then with her eyes closed. Tai Chi movements followed,  
letting her Chi, Quickening, or more scientifically the bio-  
electric currents flowing through her body, strengthening her,  
invigorating her, and slowly the aches removed from her body. Her  
mind cleared, first into a blank, then slowly her mind filled with  
all that she knew and remembered. Her mind returned to her.  
  
She ended, facing the door, her sword in the same position as  
when she started. With another swivel the sword moved to her right  
side, then she walked to the door. Schafer stood behind the door  
leaning against it. Scully briefly wondered how those stars had  
got on the window, then vaguely remembered shattering the bones in  
her hand on it.  
  
"I'm cured," Dana said calmly, pushing the intercom button.  
"You can let me out."  
  
Schafer chuckled, then looked up through the window. "You  
expect me to let you out that easily. You told me not to fall for  
any tricks, remember."  
  
"I remember. Now open the door," Scully told him,  
concentrated focus lacing her voice.  
  
Schafer looked up and into her eyes. Despite her disheveled and  
bloody look, her eyes were focused, cool and measured.  
  
"You really are back, aren't you?" Schafer asked.  
  
"Yep," she answered.  
  
Hope and relief flushed Schafer's face as he unlocked the door  
to the quarantine room and opened it. Dana walked out and saw how  
far gone he was. She grabbed an empty hypo spray from a table to  
her right, pushed it against her wrist letting it suck up a vial  
full of her blood. Once done she injected some of the blood into  
his neck. The reaction was immediate. The sores started to  
discolor.  
  
"Here," she said, handing him the still half full hypo spray,  
"filter out the anti-bodies and start synthesizing enough to  
inoculate your staff. They are going to need it to keep working. I  
don't suppose you have a sonic shower in here, do you?"  
  
"In the quarantine unit if you haven't smashed it," Schafer  
answered as he proceeded to the machine. Dana placed her katana on  
Schafer's desk and proceeded to take of her dirty clothes. Schafer  
turned around, while the computer worked on the task, and looked  
stunned.  
  
"What?" Dana asked, removing her bra. "Haven't seen a naked  
woman in a while?"  
  
"Well . . . yeah," Schafer answered, a pained expression  
crossed his face but was not able to tear his gaze away. "Three  
years ago my wife died in a shuttle accident . . . and . . . I  
haven't been with a woman since. Never wanted to."  
  
Dana smiled at him as she removed her skirt and started pulling  
down her panties. "Then by all means look, perhaps it will stir  
something in you and compel you to find yourself a lucky lady, so  
you can make each other happy." By now Dana had reached the  
replicator behind his desk. She put her clothes inside and said,  
"Clean." She didn't bother to look at the clothes dematerializing  
and rematerializing minus blood and sweat. She looked at him as  
she walked to the quarantine unit and a much needed shower. He  
seemed a bit uncomfortable, a quick scan of his body, halted at  
his crotch revealed the problem, or rather the opposite of a  
problem. "Ah, good. It seems something is stirring," Scully  
commented with a smile in her voice and one on her face.  
  
Schafer didn't manage anything past a blush and an embarrassed  
half chuckle. Part of him was disgusted at his reaction, she was  
covered in partially, dried blood, something that normally could  
make men throw up at the sight, but after three long deprived  
years, the call of nature had been irrepressible.  
  
Dana found the shower and ordered it on. The vibrations passed  
through her body, smashing away all the dried blood. She leaned  
against the wall for a moment and sighed contentedly. She turned  
of the shower and walked back outside. She grinned at Schafer's  
expression and teased, "Looks better clean, huh?"  
  
"Uh . . . yeah, it does," he managed as he watched her get  
dressed once more in clean clothes. The computer in the separating  
and synthesizing machine beeped. Schafer turned around and removed  
a vial with a clear liquid from it. "All right," he said, "now to  
mass produce this and inoculate as many as possible."  
  
Dana laughed and said, "I don't think so, how many do you think  
you'll get that way? A couple of hundred million, a billion at  
most?"  
  
"Yeah," Schafer said as he walked toward her. "What do you have  
in mind?"  
  
She smiled at him, as she sheathed her sword back in the folds  
of her robe. Accessing the computer on his desk, she said,  
"Computer, establish computer link with the 'Golden Eagle' and  
download my genetic structure from the transporter's memory  
buffer."  
  
"Affirmative. Link established. Working," the computer stated.  
  
While the computer finished extrapolating Dana's genetic  
structure from the ambassadorial ship's transporter buffer, Dana  
picked up a new hypospray in extracted some new blood from her  
hand, picked up a tricorder and had it scan her blood sample.  
  
"Interface with this tricorder and download my genetic  
structure," Dana ordered.  
  
"Affirmative. Ready," said the computer.  
  
Schafer now leaned over the sitting Dana and watched as a  
second DNA helix placed itself next to the one already present,  
both gently turned around their axis.  
  
"Compare them, and highlight any changes pertaining to the  
immune system in the newer genetic code that would create the  
anti-bodies Dr. Schafer just synthesized," said Dana.  
  
"Interfacing with synthesizer. Working. Task complete," the  
computer answered. Dana's newer genetic structure was brought to  
the middle, with a few highlighted genes.  
  
"The genetic structure needed to build the anti-bodies,"  
Schafer exclaimed. "I'm starting to understand."  
  
Dana grabbed a PADD from Schafer's desk and said, "Upload data  
on highlighted genes this PADD." The computer chirped a response  
and several seconds later the screen on the PADD showed the  
highlighted genes. "Computer, delete my genetic structures." A  
chirp from the computer told her it had completed her order.  
  
Dana stood up and said, "Let's go." Schafer walked to the door,  
with Dana on his heels. He unlocked and opened the door. With a  
big grin, he walked to Crusher and injected her with the anti-  
bodies. Beverly looked in astonishment. He just grinned and  
proceeded to the next person.  
  
"Dr. Crusher," Dana said.  
  
"Ambassador Scully. Well, well, aren't you full of surprises,"  
Beverly said with sarcasm and surprise. As she folded her arms  
across her chest, she remembered Deanna telling her about the  
mystery that surrounded Ambassadors Scully and MacLeod.  
  
"Always," Dana grinned evilly at Beverly and handed her the  
PADD. "I've got in this PADD the genes that will create the anti-  
bodies for the virus and the prions. Do you think you can engineer  
a virus that will do nothing but build these genes inside the  
infected subjects cells, right down to those in the reproductive  
organs, and then die off, so that they and their descendants will  
be immune to the Double Helix virus."  
  
Beverly's face went from revelation to a grin and answered,  
"Sure."  
  
"And do you think you can use Double Helix itself as a template  
for this virus, so it will be as infectious and will spread itself  
as rapidly as Double Helix itself, so that it will follow Double  
Helix across the Galaxy and cure everyone infected?" Dana asked  
once more.  
  
"Yeah . . . yeah, I can do that. But what I'd like to know is,  
how you didn't only get the anti-bodies, but also the genes  
required to build in so short a time," Beverly asked Dana  
powerfully.  
  
"Trust me. You don't want to know, and that goes for the rest  
of you too," Dana answered, using her psychic ability to push the  
suggestion into the minds of Crusher the others. It was the same  
ability that made some Immortals think the Gathering had started,  
the same one that made the Kurgan in his desire for power suggest  
to himself it really was the gathering when he took the ability in  
him when he took Osta Vasilek's head, the same power of suggestion  
that made Connor believe in his own hope that the Game was finally  
over, that he was the last and that he could have children, grow  
old and die.  
  
"Of course I don't want to know," said Dr. Crusher, as if it  
was the most obvious and natural choice in the universe. Schafer  
silently agreed, he really didn't want to know, and wished he  
didn't know, but he vowed he would take the secret to his grave.  
  
Dana turned to leave, but Beverly suddenly grabbed her arm,  
releasing it when Dana turned towards her. "Wait," she said. "Now  
that you've given us the cure, where are you going?"  
  
"I am going to find whoever created this virus . . . and chop  
his or her head off," Dana answered and briskly walked out the  
laboratory.  
  
*****  
  
Fifteen minutes later  
Rania III, Spaceport  
The Golden Eagle  
  
"Get out," ordered Dana to the pilot and the few engineers that  
were inside the small eagle-like vessel.  
  
"Uh, Ma'am," the Starfleet pilot started, "I don't think, I'm .  
. ."  
  
"Get out, now, or I'll beam you all off," Dana interrupted.  
  
"Uh, yes, ma'am," the pilot said and left the ship. "Come on,  
she doesn't want us on board," he motioned to the engineers who  
reluctantly followed suit.  
  
A few seconds later the ship lifted up in the air and the  
landing gear pulled up into the ship.  
  
*I need to find this loon, best start with his known  
accomplices. Only one comes to mind that I can find easily. Not  
surprisingly, time to visit a loony bin,* Dana though, as she laid  
in the course for the main Federation institute for the criminally  
insane in orbit around Beta Omega III.  
  
A communication light blinked and Dana activated a small  
screen. Through the view screen she watched the Enterprise move to  
intercept her. "This is Captain Jean-Luc Picard of the Enterprise.  
This planet is under quarantine, you are not allowed to leave.  
Turn your vessel around now."  
  
"Sorry to disappoint you, captain. But I'm leaving," Dana  
answered him, seeing recognition and a little surprise on his  
face. "Besides, everybody is already infected so I can't make it  
worse and on top of that: I'm already cured, either Dr. Crusher  
will contact you on that soon, or she's forgotten to tell you all  
together, working on a mass distribution version of what cured  
me."  
  
"That may or may not be true, Ambassador. But you still will  
not leave this planet," Picard said with authority.  
  
"Watch me," Dana answered him and cut off the transmission.  
  
*****  
  
"Lock a tractor beam on her ship," Picard ordered, annoyed.  
"She should know better."  
  
"Captain," Data said. "Tractor beam is not responding, sensors  
are off line."  
  
"Propulsion is off line as well, sir," answered the woman at  
the helm console, to Data's right.  
  
"What!?" Picard exclaimed, before tapping his communicator.  
"Mr. LaForge, what's going on?"  
  
"Nothing is really going on, sir," LaForge's voice came back  
through the commbadge. "Everything is in working order, it's just  
that someone used the command codes and turned off those areas of  
the ship."  
  
"What!? How the hell did she get her hands on those command  
codes?" Picard cursed. He turned to Counselor Troi after she gave  
a short 'hm'. Picard could not quite except Deanna's theory on  
Ambassador Scully, but the smile on Counselor's Troi told him,  
'You know how. You just have to accept it.' Picard turned back  
around and saw the 'Golden Eagle's' warp nacelles lighted up and  
the ship disappear into warp.  
  
"Captain, sensors and tractor beam have come back on line,"  
Data told Picard.  
  
"Propulsion too, sir," the ensign behind the helm console  
answered.  
  
"Mr. Laforge?" Picard asked, after tapping his commbadge.  
  
"Not me, captain. I think this fast, would even be too much of  
a miracle for Scotty to pull off," Geordie answered.  
  
"Understood. Mr. Fowley contact that ship's pilot," Picard said  
with anger, the ever increasing symptoms of the disease in his  
body, did nothing to improve his mood.  
  
"Yes, sir," answered the man communications officer.  
  
A moment later the face of a young lieutenant came on the  
screen. "Lieutenant Sardonnay here, sir," he said.  
  
"Lieutenant, why are you not on board your ship?" Picard asked,  
his voice stern. He was beyond annoyed.  
  
"The ambassador ordered us off, sir," Sardonnay answered.  
  
"Isn't that against regulations, Lieutenant?" Picard asked,  
almost angry.  
  
"That's what I tried to tell the Ambassador, sir, right before  
she threatened to beam me and the engineers off the ship. What  
could I do, phaser her down?"  
  
*That would be a start,* Picard thought. Another voice in his  
head conceded that Sardonnay could not have done much else but  
obey the ambassador.  
  
"So she stole the ship?" Picard asked, more as a statement than  
a real question.  
  
"No, sir," Sardonnay answered. "The ship was assigned to her,  
so she didn't steal it. She's just using it in a manner that is  
against regulations."  
  
"Thank you, Mr. Sardonnay. Picard out." Sardonnay nodded before  
the screen showed the planet again.  
  
"Captain," Nurse Ogawa said as she walked on to the bridge.  
"They have found anti-bodies to fight the disease, sir. I'm here  
to administer it."  
  
Picard nodded and gestured she should continued. Riker stood up  
and asked, "So the ambassador was telling the truth then?"  
  
"If you can do, what she did too us, would you bother with a  
lie?" Deanna said in a strained voice.  
  
"Of course not," Picard answered, as Alyssa pressed a hypospray  
to his neck. She proceeded to Riker and Troi.  
  
"Mr. Fowley, contact Dr. Crusher," Picard ordered.  
  
"Aye, sir," he answered and a moment later Beverly Crusher's  
face appeared on screen.  
  
"Doctor you seem to have neglected to mention that you found  
the cure," Picard stated, a bit niffed.  
  
"Well, I was busy relaying the information on how to synthesize  
it to nurse Ogawa. And now we are busy on making this a mass  
distributable cure. It slipped my mind," Beverly said, as sweat  
dripping from her face.  
  
"Ambassador Scully claimed she was inoculated, is this true?"  
Picard asked.  
  
"I should say so, since -- to rectify your previous statement -  
- she and Dr. Schafer were the ones who found the cure, not me,"  
Dr. Crusher said, then turned to one of the other doctors to  
confer.  
  
Picard looked back at his first officer and his counselor for a  
moment with an astonished gaze on his face. Troi and Riker for  
their part returned the gaze. *Another mystery,* Troi thought to  
herself, eager to find out who Ambassador Scully truly was. She  
berated herself for thinking she had all but figured out the good  
Ambassador. She had thought that only a few more details were  
needed. Now she decided she would not underestimate this woman and  
how many more surprises she could produce again.  
  
"Doctor, if I may ask, how are you going to mass-distribute  
this cure?" Picard asked intrigued.  
  
"Simple, Jean-Luc. The cure is anti-bodies. I have the genes  
that tell a body how to make those anti-bodies. I make a virus  
that puts those genes inside a patient's genetic structure.  
Patient proceeds to cure him- or herself," Beverly answered,  
impatience creeping into her voice.  
  
"How did you get by those genes?" Picard asked in disbelief  
  
"I didn't create the cure, remember Captain. I don't know and I  
don't want to know. Now if there is nothing else . . ." Dr.  
Crusher said, impatient to get back to work. Even minute delays  
mean millions of lives, and they wasted her time with trivial  
details.  
  
"No, nothing, Doctor," Picard answered, flabbergasted.  
  
"Good, Crusher out."  
  
"Captain, there was something wrong with Dr. Crusher," Deanna  
Troi said with apprehension.  
  
"No kidding? Instead of trying to find out how they made that  
cure, so she could use that technique a possible next time, she  
brushes it aside like it's an unimportant detail," Riker commented  
deadpan.  
  
"What were you able to pick up, Counselor?" Picard asked.  
  
Deanna stood up in order to explain better, using gestures.  
"It's like a hypnotic suggestion only far more powerful, she  
really doesn't want to know how they got that cure."  
  
"Do you think you can break through this control?" Picard asked  
her.  
  
"If it were mind control, I probably could, because then her  
own mind would sooner or later help me out," Deanna said, a bit  
frustrated, she did not quite know how to explain this. "But she's  
not under mind control. Like I said this is like a very, powerful  
suggestion that she accepted as being true. So, if I want set her  
free of it, I'm going to have to go against her will, and she  
herself, her own mind will be battling me all the way. I would  
suggest getting a full telepath to work with her, that would have  
the best chances for results."  
  
Picard nodded. "We'll see about that once the more direct  
crisis has been solved. Now, it seems we once more have to wait  
until the doctors finish their work."  
Chapter Three: The Hunt  
  
Picard was annoyed, although he did not show it to anyone.  
There was nothing he could do but wait, and he hated it. Here was  
possibly the most devastating and important event of the century  
and there was nothing he could do. He was forced to stand idly by  
as a rogue ambassador took off with a Federation ship. An  
ambassador with access to the command codes of his ship, codes  
that should only be known to a Starfleet captain. There was  
nothing he could do, except log the violation and have her brought  
up on charges.  
  
"Captain," came LaForge's voice across the commbadge.  
  
"Yes, Mr. LaForge?"  
  
"I was wrong, sir. It was not the command codes that she used  
to disable the ship, but her own separate access codes," LaForge  
explained.  
  
"Very well, Mr. LaForge. Can you remove her access to the  
ship?" Picard asked, as he fidgeted his fingers on the command  
chair.  
  
"Sorry, captain. I've checked the more common ways of accessing  
our computer, but I've found nothing. Which means that she's not  
using a common, reusable, piece of access software, but original  
lines of software code. The operating system is made out of  
hundreds of milliards of lines of code. Searching through all of  
them . . ." LaForge answered.  
  
"Data?" Picard asked.  
  
"Without sacrificing any of my regular duties, I could probably  
find it within about a week, sir," Mr. Data answered after a quirk  
with his head.  
  
"And if you commit all of your time to the task?" Picard asked.  
  
"Approximately one and a half day, sir," Data answered. "But I  
recommend against it, sir. I think it's a waste of time. If she  
has her own original lines of software, that means that she was  
part of the team that programmed this system and she will have  
multiple ways of accessing the ship's computer and reinstating her  
programming or even add brand new lines of code. We'd be right  
back where we started without us knowing about it, sir and now  
that we know, we might be able to stop, or stall her when she  
tries again. The only real way to eliminate her access is writing  
a new operating system from scratch."  
  
Picard nodded thoughtfully a few times before answering, "All  
right, let's keep the ship's systems the way they are and work on  
prevention next time she tries." Picard was fuming inside. That  
insufferable woman was driving him mad. Last time he met her, he  
got a reprimand from an admiral about having her and the other  
ambassador shadowed after his chief of security found that they  
had the swords on their persons, instead of as expected tucked  
away safely in their luggage. Now she had information he did not  
have, access she should not have and seemed to be a step ahead of  
him and yet . . . Picard ground his teeth together as his  
instincts irrevocably drew him in a direction he did not want to  
go, but he could not avoid. She had everything he could ever want  
in a woman. She was strong, intelligent and every bit his equal.  
On top of that, she was someone he could not control. A challenge,  
and if there was something Picard liked, it was a challenge. He  
dismissed the thought as inappropriate. He rationalized that hey  
had nothing in common, she was all wrong for him, and despite a  
few characteristics he wanted, she annoyed him more than anything  
else. His slight attraction to her made him even more annoyed than  
he already was.  
  
"Captain, I've got an incoming transmission from the governor,"  
Fowley announced.  
  
"On screen," Picard answered as he stood up, eager for  
something to happen that he could control.  
  
"Yes, Governor. What can I do for you?"  
  
"I've got someone who's rather adamant about leaving our  
planet. More so than anyone else. He's clearly infected, he's  
sweating and there are sores on his body, but he claims he will be  
fine, if we only let him go," the governor stated.  
  
"I don't see, how this is any different from any of the other  
ships on the ground. People up here are claiming the same thing,"  
Picard asked.  
  
"Are you certain about that?" the governor asked with a  
crooked, knowing smile. "Because until now, I've only had people  
who seem uninfected, claim to be fine and that they would stay  
that way as long as we let them go."  
  
Picard face lit up in revelation. "You've got the one who  
distributed the virus."  
  
"Exactly, and I was wondering what you want me to do with him,"  
the governor stated.  
  
"Captain," Riker said as he stood up and placed himself beside  
Captain Picard. "If we let him go . . ."  
  
". . . He might lead us straight to the ones responsible. I was  
thinking the same thing, Number One," Picard interrupted his  
executive officer.  
  
"Governor, can you send us the coordinates of this man's ship?"  
  
"Of course," the governor answered as he pushed a few buttons  
on the console in front of him.  
  
"Mr. LaForge," Picard said after tapping a his commbadge. "I'm  
sending you the coordinates of a ship, do you think you can tag it  
with a undetectable locator beacon?"  
  
"Not a problem, captain. Give me a few minutes and the  
transporter room will have something to beam down," LaForge  
answered, excitedly.  
  
"Make it so, Mr. LaForge."  
  
Several minutes later a small ship lifted off from Rania II and  
went into warp. Shortly after the Enterprise followed pursuit at a  
leisurely pace.  
  
*****  
  
"I'd like to see a patient you've got here," Dana said to the  
clerk at the entrance of the institute.  
  
*How ironic,* Dana thought as she looked at the Tellarite who  
seemed as healthy as a fish and realised that nobody had visited  
this place in the past few months. Insanity was rare and most who  
fit that discription could be treated rather easily with drugs.  
*Of all the people who could have survived this disease it would  
have to be the psychopaths that would have.*  
  
"State your name, subject's name and your business," the  
Tellarite snorted.  
  
"Ambassador Dana Scully, Sela, and finding the person who wants  
to wipe out all life in the galaxy," Scully dead panned.  
  
The Tellarite's head jerked up and looked her over, trying to  
decide whether she was serious or not. Then when he decided she  
was, he tried to decided whether to let her in, or let her in and  
have her committed at the same time. Finally he decided she was  
sane, handed her a PADD and said, "Fill this in."  
  
Fifteen minutes later Dana stepped into Sela's room. The half  
Human/half Romulan was lying on a raised bio-bed staring upward  
into nothingness.  
  
"If you don't mind me asking, ma'am," asked the warden, who had  
walked her to Sela's room. "How are you going to get anything out  
of her? She's practically a plant. Are you telepathic?"  
  
"A bit, now leave the room, please. I need to concentrate,"  
Dana told him, slowly walking around the bio-bed appraising the  
still form of the former Romulan Commander.  
  
"Will do, ma'am," the man answered and left.  
  
Dana walked around the bio-bed for a few minutes raising her  
concentration. "Well," she said, as she placed her hands on Sela's  
face. "Here goes nothing."  
  
"My mind to your mind, my thoughts to your thoughts," Dana  
whispered, looking at Sela's expressionless face.  
  
~~X~~  
  
July, 2084  
Shakir, Vulcan  
  
T'Lar walked through the town, she knew so well. She was headed  
toward the guest district. It had been two years since the first  
had arrived. Humans, they called themselves. Not long ago the  
Humans had almost annihilated themselves in a nuclear war, now  
they were quickly rebuilding and founding a seemingly peaceful  
civilization. T'Lar was one of the few Vulcans who had been  
assigned as a liaison to the party of Humans. Her job was to teach  
them about Vulcan, Vulcans and the Vulcan way. She had found these  
Humans to be aggravating, violent and emotional to the point of  
being unbalanced. At first T'Lar had embraced her duties, at  
barely thirty years of age, she had been assigned to be a cultural  
liaison and been determined to perform her duties well. She had  
found that was more difficult than she thought. She had complained  
to her teachers that she was not suited to the task. She had given  
logical reasons why she was not suited for the assignment,  
however, instead of being reassigned, as she had expected, they  
had told her it was a good learning experience in finding a way to  
overcome difficulties.  
  
In the two years that had passed since the first group of ten  
Humans had arrived on Vulcan, their number had grown to steadily  
to a hundred. Although that number was steady the population was  
not, new ones arrived while others left. T'Lar had grown to  
tolerate the Humans. For some strange reason she felt akin to  
them, despite the fact that she found no logical reason for it. If  
there was anything her logic told her, it was that she was  
anything but akin to them. They were aggravating to the extreme;  
many a times she had needed meditating in order to keep her  
emotions under control. Yet, she had become somehow fond of them.  
In particular the exceptional woman she had started to consider,  
to her own surprise, to be a friend.  
  
From the moment the woman, Sally Trent, had arrived on Vulcan  
she had acted totally differently from all the other Humans. Where  
the others had merely been amused or interested in the Vulcan way  
of logic, they never showed any sign of wanting to practice it. At  
times they had even looked down on it. Sally had expressed a  
desire to actively take up the Vulcan way and banish all her  
emotions. She had started studying with, among others, T'Lar.  
Where Humans needed medication in order to breathe efficiently in  
the Vulcan atmosphere, sally did not. And where other Humans had  
merely expressed curiosity to try a Vulcan mind meld, Sally had  
shown greater fascination, but had steadfastly refused to join in  
one. No matter how logical T'Lar's arguments had been, Sally had  
stubbornly refused. When questioned why, she had answered on more  
than on occasion, 'Trust me, you don't want to know.' The answer  
had puzzled T'Lar and she had meditated on it on more than one  
occasion to find a deeper meaning but had found none. To her  
Sally's reply was an erroneous statement; alone the fact that she  
had asked Sally, clearly proved that she did want to know.  
Furthermore T'Lar was perfectly aware of what she did or did not  
want to know. Eventually she had decided to drop the subject.  
  
T'Lar was headed to Sally's apartment deeply contemplating her  
recent behaviour. Sally's control of her emotions seemed to be  
slipping, she was getting agitated more easily. She also seemed  
almost constantly depressed and it was getting worse. T'Lar was  
trying to find a way to get Sally back on track. She missed  
Sally's enthusiastic way of studying the Vulcan way. Why that was  
she did not know. Even though missing it seemed illogical, there  
was no way she could shake the sensation.  
  
T'Lar's ears picked up something peculiar that sounded like  
metal clanging on metal. She decided to investigate and moved  
towards the sound. As she neared, she became aware that it was the  
sound of clashing swords. Without noticing it she quickened her  
step. She was moving towards an area that was sparsely populated.  
The guest section of Shakir, held all kinds of facilities that  
were not necessary for Vulcans. It was built larger than required  
with the future in mind. Vulcans, ever logical, had envisioned  
that with time they would make more contacts with other species,  
thus requiring more guest lodging.  
  
T'Lar heard voices. One pleading, the other mocking. As she  
neared the origin of the sounds and voices she recognized one. It  
was Sally. Finally reaching the site of the commotion, T'Lar  
slowed down at the corner. She took a moment to center herself,  
pushed down any illogical emotions that the sounds and Sally's  
presence had stirred and she rounded the corner . . . She saw  
Sally and an unknown man fighting in an all out sword battle.  
Anger and a feeling of insult swept through T'Lar. How dared they  
defile Vulcan in such a way? One did not fight with swords on  
Vulcan. Vulcans only fought under extreme circumstances and always  
unarmed, with the exception of ritual battles, but as the name  
suggested they were more often than not just a ritual that wasn't  
fatal in every way and when they were they were under the  
strictest regulations. T'Lar suppressed the emotion quickly and  
reminded herself to meditate on these events. The sight also  
stirred something primal in her, a deep fascination coursed  
through her. T'Lar decided that logic dictated she needed to  
understand why and what Sally was doing, so she watched the fight  
play itself out.  
  
*****  
  
"Please," Dana pleaded on the verge of tears, parrying his  
blows. "Don't make me do this. I've killed too many already." She  
had hoped to outrun the game for a little while, but the horror  
had followed her here.  
  
"Sorry, girly. Your Quickening is mine," he grinned, his green  
eyes reflected a confidence she did not possess and an eagerness  
for the kill she did not feel. Everything about him scared her. He  
was strong, fast and deadly. Everything she did not want to be,  
everything she wanted to banish for good.  
  
She was on the defense and aware that she was losing. Winded,  
out of breath, getting cut and hurt, she knew she needed to defend  
herself, but didn't feel the desire to. Part of her wanted to give  
up and let him decapitate her. But another part of her cried,  
*Never.* A terrifying voice inside her roared and with it and with  
it came a terrifying bloodlust, fueled by finely honed survival  
instincts. She fell back on the Vulcan teachings of logic and to  
suppress those feelings. Logic controlled her now, and the part  
that had fallen back to those teachings, the part that wanted to  
stop fighting and killing, was surprised that logic dictated  
survival and the need to fight back. As that emotional part too  
was suppressed, she started to fight back.  
  
As reality returned, Dana noticed that her inner battle had  
allowed her opponent to maneuver her into a deadly position. He  
had her. She did the only thing she could do, parried his swipe  
then rushed at him, her sword swinging at his neck. A fright  
gripped her surpassing all that she had felt before. She could see  
it so accurately, the only thing he had to do was attack, move  
into her swing, parry it and then there was nothing she could do  
to stop him from making the killing strike. An incredible relief  
swept through her as she saw him try to avoid her desperate swing.  
Then with utter horror, she watched as her sword sliced through  
his neck. A little blood spurted from his neck, before the energy  
that was building up inside the decapitated body kept the rest  
trapped inside, then the head and body dropped to the floor.  
  
Dana felt dead inside and utterly defeated. Sinking to her  
knees she started crying.  
  
*****  
  
The mixture of feelings T'Lar was experiencing was unfamiliar  
to her. With every ounce of strength she possessed, she pushed  
them down and analyzed her feelings. First there was betrayal. How  
could the gentle woman she considered a friend be so completely  
ruthless and chop a man's head off? Then there was anger at  
Sally's actions, and at herself for being fooled. Than there was  
the horrifying sense of satisfaction, pleasure and enjoyment at  
the sight of the severed head flying through the air. A small  
voice inside her had even screamed, *That's it!*  
  
T'Lar stepped from behind the corner and walked forward,  
determined to place Sally under arrest and speak her mind. She got  
no further than a few steps when she saw it. No amount of self  
control could keep her emotions in check. It defied every logic  
she knew. Her jaw dropped. A mixture of amazement, curiosity,  
fascination, fear, and finally an overwhelming sense of awe filled  
her.  
  
Sally was kneeling on the ground and crying, "Oh, god, not  
again. Please, not again. Oh, god, I did it again." Small sparks  
of electricity curved away from the dead body. A sharp wind picked  
up. The air started to crackle with electricity. Then a mist  
detached itself from the dead body, a luminous plasma sparkling  
with electricity. The plasma mist slowly floated towards Sally,  
while the power in the air continued to build. Large sparks  
crackled along the ground and the surrounding buildings, at times  
curving across the alley. T'Lar felt the electricity raise her  
hair and hastily took a few steps back. Sally gave an agonizing  
wail of protest as the mist started to enter her body. Her face  
contorted with emotion and horror. Sally wailed again. She  
screamed, "No!" as if she knew something else was coming.  
  
Then a powerful lightning strike blasted from the dead body and  
slammed into Sally's chest. Her eyes flew open, head shot back,  
body jerked and then she screamed. T'Lar watched with horror and  
fascination. T'Lar noticed that Sally screamed not in pain as she  
had expected, but mostly in pleasure. Illogically she thought,  
*The Eater of Souls.* Another blast left the body, this time  
slamming into Sally's side. She screamed again in pained ecstacy.  
Than a blast left Sally's body and slammed into the building. To  
the credit of Vulcan's construction quality only a little bit of  
stone broke of. Lightning blasts started following each other in  
rapid succession, blasting up sand, or blasting off stone,  
depending on whether the blast landed in the sand or on a  
building. Some of them disappeared into the sky. Strangely the  
lightning strikes that struck Sally didn't seem to hurt her and  
barely effected her clothing. Then, just as suddenly as the whole  
incident started it stopped. Only an occasional spark of power  
sizzling on the floor or a wall remained.  
  
*****  
  
Dana lay on the floor, crying and completely shattered. She had  
killed again and taken another Quickening. She felt revolted at  
herself, and at once more feeling the overwhelming sense of  
pleasure and ecstasy of a Quickening. She had felt him enter her,  
becoming one with her, for a moment been unable to distinguish  
where she began and where he ended. He would forever remain inside  
her, fueling her with unwanted power and knowledge.  
  
With an effort she sat up, feeling a presence nearby. She  
laughed in despair as she saw T'Lar standing over her, emotions  
playing across her face that only gradually came back under  
control.  
  
"Who . . . or what are you? Are you the Eater of Souls?" T'Lar  
asked, fascinated but fearful.  
  
Dana chuckled, recognizing one of Vulcan's oldest myths: a  
horrible beast that resided in storms and ate the souls, the Katra  
of any unsuspecting Vulcan. "Not that I know of, no," Dana managed  
through her tears. Not liking the position she was in, she slowly  
staggered back to her feet.  
  
"Then . . . what?" T'Lar asked.  
  
"I am a hundred and twenty years old. I died eighty-two years  
ago of cancer . . . and then woke up. Since then, I have not aged  
and nothing short of decapitation cand kill me," Dana paused, then  
shrugged. "I am Immortal."  
  
"And he . . . was as well," T'Lar said, following her logical.  
  
"Yes," Dana answered, wiping her tears away, as she slowly got  
her crying under control. She looked at the dead Immortal and felt  
an overwhelming sense of guilt.  
  
"And when you killed him, you gained his Katra."  
  
Dana marveled at T'Lar's deductive capabilities. "Yes," Dana  
answered simply as guilt threatened to overwhelm her. She watched  
T'Lar who kept looking from the decapitated body to Dana, and down  
again. Dana was tense. The hand that held her sword was ready for  
action. Dana hated it, but could not relax her sword arm. It was  
the part that would kill in order survive that kept ready, and she  
certainly would have to if T'Lar decided to tell on her and have  
her locked up in prison . . . or worse.  
  
"What were you planning to do with the body?" T'Lar asked.  
  
Dana smiled, relieved that T'Lar had accepted what she was.  
Suppressing the smile along with the emotion, she said, "I hadn't  
thought that far ahead."  
  
"We could leave a message and go on an unexpected survival,  
then feed him to a le-matya. It'll eat him bone and all," T'Lar  
stated without emotion. "And if it doesn't, then it will still  
look as if he died from the le-matya's attack."  
  
Dana looked at her a bit stunned, she had done a lot of things  
to get rid of a body, but never had she fed it to a deadly  
predator. "I don't know what to say except . . . thank you," Dana  
answered with a deeply guilt ridden face.  
  
*****  
  
One day later  
  
From a secure vantage point, Dana and T'Lar watched the male  
le-matya ripping apart the decapitated body of the dead Immortal.  
After a few more minutes of checking they decided that there would  
not be enough of the body left to identify, they started walking  
back to their encampment eight hundred meters away.  
  
They walked in silence, as they had the way into the desert.  
Both opting to stay lost in their thoughts, contemplating their  
deed.  
  
"So . . ." T'Lar started, not knowing how to do that start.  
This was a matter of the heart, her logic failed her. In the end  
she decided to simply come out and say it. A small part of her  
could not help but feel that logic was mistaken, that she was  
overstepping a Human boundary. The same way a lot of Humans  
overstepped Vulcan boundaries when they touched a Vulcan, or asked  
about their mating habits. "What emotional trauma are you trying  
to overcome?"  
  
Dana's head whipped around, then, far too quickly and far too  
adamant, she answered, "I'm not trying to overcome anything."  
  
"You are the only Human here, who is trying to suppress her  
emotions. You have mood swings, more than the average Human  
female, who seem to get them on average 28.44 Terran days. You are  
often tired, indicating insomnia, and you have been extremely  
depressed for at least the last 9.71 Terran days. Your Human Dr.  
Tiang has told me that those are classic symptoms associated with  
what he called post-traumatic stress disorder," T'Lar explained.  
  
"You have been busy, haven't you?" Dana said her voice tight  
with anger. "Have you ever heard of the word 'privacy'?"  
  
"Yes. Vulcans are very private."  
  
"Then perhaps you should pick up a dictionary and re-examine  
its meaning," Dana fumed.  
  
"I understand its meaning," T'Lar simply said.  
  
"Really, does privacy mean, check up on every detail of your  
friend's life, talk to doctors who never talked to that friend,  
then accusing her of all kinds of psychological defects?" Dana  
asked, getting angrier by the moment.  
  
"It is not logical for one to deny a medical problem," T'Lar  
answered.  
  
"Yes, just as logical as it is to be afraid of touch, or not to  
talk about ones mating habits," Dana spat out.  
  
T'Lar felt the cold remarks. *The truth hurts,* popped in her  
head, a favorite expression of the Humans. Her culture was not the  
topic and at that moment irrelevant. "Our culture is irre . . ."  
  
Dana stopped walking and turned to T'Lar. "Look! Just quit it!  
I have no emotional trauma, and that's it!" Dana screamed. Then,  
despite the heat, she picked up her pace and started walking even  
faster.  
  
"I breached some Human cultural barrier, did I not?" T'Lar  
asked disturbed.  
  
Dana just snorted and sped her pace even more.  
  
*****  
  
The next day  
  
T'Lar was considering how she could get Dana to open up and  
face her problems. "Now that I know your secret, I could perform a  
Vulcan mind meld with you," T'Lar said. They were walking through  
the Vulcan desert again, heading toward Shakir and home.  
  
"You could?" Dana asked, her enthusiasm showing. She and T'Lar  
had not talked much since the day before. Dana felt like talking,  
but the prospect of experiencing a mind meld was an even bigger  
excitement. Ever since she heard of it, she had wondered what it  
would be like to share a living mind with someone else. Sharing  
dead minds was something she was used to, that was her essence; a  
living mind merged with ancient dead ones. But a living one . . .  
that was something else.  
  
"We could do it right now. No one that could see or hear  
anything they shouldn't," answered T'Lar.  
  
Dana kept walking as she thought it through. Her curiosity won  
over and she said, "Yes, let's do it right now."  
  
A few seconds later they were both sitting in the lotus  
position on Vulcan's hot sand. T'Lar gently placed her fingers on  
Dana's face. Her action was driven by curiosity and concern for  
her friend. "My mind to your mind, my thoughts to your thoughts,"  
T'Lar said . . . and the landscape changed. First there were  
clouds where none had been before. Then suddenly the landscape  
became green, plants of all shapes and sizes, green grass, bushes,  
trees filled T'Lar's view. Birds started to chirp, followed by the  
sounds of other animals. A large waterfall cascaded in the  
distance. T'Lar was astounded. Although she had seen similar  
landscapes in other minds, the sheer volume of life in such overly  
visible manner, and the sheer abundance of water never ceased to  
amaze her.  
  
"Welcome to Earth, or rather an idealistic picture of it,"  
Dana's voice came from behind T'Lar's.  
  
T'Lar started to turn around but stopped halfway at the sound  
of a friendly man's voice. "Hi." T'Lar was startled. "Oh, I'm  
sorry," the man said as he walked past her. T'Lar's gaze followed  
the man. "I didn't mean to startle you." The man walked straight  
toward Dana. T'Lar expected him to slow down, but he did not.  
Instead he distorted and disappeared into a Dana.  
  
"He was another Katra . . . a Katra of . . ." T'Lar tried to  
say.  
  
"Of one of the Immortals I killed? Yes," Dana finished for  
T'Lar with a self-conscious smile. "And there are a lot more of  
them," Dana answered with sadness. T'Lar became aware of many  
minds around her, some ancient, some sad, some honest, some so  
evil that it caused shivers to run down her spine. They were  
faint, as if they were not truly there . . . as if they were not  
alive. T'Lar realized, as she probed a bit further that they were  
all centralized and entangled in Sally . . . no, that was wrong.  
Dana was her name, Dana Katherine Scully. T'Lar took a good look  
at Dana and noticed that she was different too. Where Sally's hair  
was mousy brown, Dana's was vibrantly red. Dana herself seemed  
vibrant, almost painful to the eye, it was like looking at energy  
itself.  
  
"So strange, feeling your emotion and thoughts inside of me,"  
Dana said. "Your emotions run rather deep and are very powerful.  
Are you ready?"  
  
"Ready?" T'Lar asked a bit confused.  
  
"Yes, you didn't think this was all did you?" Dana asked. As  
Dana spoke T'Lar felt as if she was slowly be drawn into  
something. The pace quickened, and for a moment she could feel the  
true scale of Dana's mind. As layer upon layer of minds and  
century upon century of memories blasted through her, she  
staggered under the onslaught. Suddenly everything returned to the  
garden with Dana standing in front of her again.  
  
"You all right? I'm sorry, I should have taken it slower," Dana  
said with concern in her voice.  
  
"I'll be fine," T'Lar said, her voice cracking. "I just need a  
few moments to pull myself back together."  
  
"Let me help you," Dana offered.  
  
"That will not be necessary," T'Lar said as cool as she could  
muster.  
  
"No, no, I'll help . . ." Dana paused, her expression changed.  
"You're hiding something from me."  
  
"No, I'm not . . ." T'Lar started.  
  
"Yes, you are!" Dana exclaimed forcefully.  
  
"So are you," T'Lar stated without emotion. She pulled all her  
strength together. She had a feeling she was going to need it. The  
oppressing sense of secrecy that she had felt from the minute  
their minds had joined focused into a single point. A huge gate  
fell from the sky, and with a mighty slam dropped into the soil.  
It was locked with huge locks and wrapped in chains. T'Lar walked  
toward it.  
  
"No!" Dana practically screamed. "You will not go in there!"  
  
"Dana," T'Lar stated, the joining of their minds made the name  
come out as easily as if it were her own. "Whatever is in there is  
eating you up. If you don't deal with it quickly it will haunt you  
forever," T'Lar said. T'Lar pulled at the gate's lock -- Dana's  
mind was powerful, but untrained and unfocused -- the chains and  
locks fell away easily.  
  
"Don't! You have no idea what you are unleashing. Don't open  
it, I beg of you! Please don't go in there!" Dana pleaded, as she  
slowly sank to her knees in weakness and fear.  
  
T'Lar nudged the gate and it opened. Suddenly the environment  
changed. The garden was gone. In its place was a vast city scape  
stretched out. T'Lar looked around in confusion and noticed that  
all the people were standing still, except the sobbing, kneeling  
form of Dana Scully. T'lar had seen many pictures of Earth's  
cities and glimpses of them in the minds of other Humans but she  
did not recognize this one. T'Lar looked further and was startled  
as she saw another Dana Scully. This frozen incarnation was  
blonde.  
  
*A memory,* T'Lar thought. Suddenly it got darker. She looked  
upward and saw the sky filling with foreboding clouds. Lightning  
flashed in the skies, immediately followed by a loud clap of  
thunder.  
  
"Why did you do that, bitch?!" a dark powerful voice came from  
Dana. She was standing and a powerful wind whirled around her. "I  
told you not to open that door, but did you listen? Of course not,  
because the logical, slut of Vulcan knows better, doesn't she? You  
had to make me relive this again, didn't you?"  
  
T'Lar was at a loss for words. Dana the good friend was gone.  
What remained was a powerful, and frightening visage of darkness  
filled with darkness. The skies turned pitch black at the sound of  
her voice.  
  
Dana walked forward, grabbed T'Lar by the neck and squeezed  
hard. "You wanted to see my secret, fine! Now you get to see it,  
all of it! And you will experience it too, all the pain, all the  
horror! Welcome to my private hell!" Dana screamed in hatred.  
There was a bright flash of light and the frozen landscape came  
alive. The people started to scream in terror and ran away. T'Lar  
looked at the diminished light and understood. A cold fear gripped  
her, a fear too great to control. In the distance she saw a  
mushroom cloud that signaled a nuclear explosion. T'Lar started to  
struggle against Dana's grip, and felt it slowly start to slip.  
"Don't bother escaping," Dana said eerily calm. "Even if you  
escape my grasp, you'll never escape its grasp." Dana laughed and  
started to laugh even harder when T'Lar managed to slip from her  
grasp.  
  
T'Lar started to run. The Dana from the memory stopped, and  
slowly turned around. "Where are you gonna go?" the evil Dana  
called, as the temperature around them started to rise rapidly.  
"There's nowhere to run, nowhere to hide!" Evil Dana laughed.  
T'Lar stopped running as logic took over the fearful response of  
running. T'Lar stared at the Memory Dana just standing there and  
staring at the mushroom cloud with deadly fascination. T'Lar felt  
the searing heat, start to blister her skin. Her hair caught on  
fire as everything around her seemed to explode. Over the  
thundering roar of the lightning flashes and the explosions Evil  
Dana called and laughed, "Like the show, T'Lar? This is where I  
thought to myself, 'Don't worry, Dana. You'll survive.'"  
  
Then T'Lar felt herself ignite, just like everybody else around  
her. The pain was beyond anything she ever felt. Nothing was left  
of her self control. Then as the shockwave hit she felt herself  
being thrown through the air.  
  
"Did you like it, T'Lar?" she heard Dana scream. T'Lar looked  
over to the memory Dana should be, to see only blackened corpses.  
Her keen eyesight saw movement at one of them; a tiny electric  
spark arched across the charred body then blackened slivers of  
flesh started to fall from the body. She looked down at herself,  
as she felt incredible pains wrack her body. Black slivers of her  
flesh cracked and fell as she moved. Standing up felt as if she  
ran into a bed of spikes.  
  
"Welcome to my realm, T'Lar!" T'Lar heard Dana exclaim. Intense  
pain overwhelmed her as she turned around and looked at a blazing  
Dana Scully. She laughed, then said, "In here, I am master!" The  
flames disappeared, and a Dana Scully bearing a sword stepped  
forward, grinning evilly. "Are you happy?" Dana asked in a dark  
tone.  
  
The sight brought T'Lar back to herself and logic took over.  
"This is not real, this is not real," she chanted with her eyes  
closed. She opened them to find her clothes back on her body which  
was as it was before the explosion.  
  
"How nice," said a cracked voice to T'Lar's right. A scorched  
corpse slowly got up, like a visage straight out of a horror movie  
it walked toward her. "Very nice, sweet cheeks. I like the pointy  
ears," it said as it advanced toward T'Lar. Fear once again  
gripped her, as the almost skeleton walked towards her. Its hand  
shot out and grabbed T'Lar's neck, and lifted her effortlessly off  
the ground. The scorched flesh disappeared to be replaced by a  
huge mean man holding a large sword in his left hand. "I know it's  
time for you to die," he said with a maniacal grin, placing the  
sword at T'Lar's throat. "But I'm certain the mistress will allow  
me a good time, before I kill you."  
  
"Oh, absolutely, Bertrand," a blonde Dana said to T'Lar's  
right.  
  
"Yep, have your fun," Evil Dana said to her left.  
  
T'Lar smashed her knee into the man's balls, and he let her go  
as he doubled over in pain. She started running into a small  
street, glancing over her shoulder in fear. The man was back up  
and running after her already. "You're gonna pay for that, bitch!"  
he screamed. *Immortal healing power,* T'Lar realized. Both Dana's  
joined him in the chase, and they were getting closer. Lightning  
and thunder started to flash and rumble, and suddenly all the  
scorched body's started to get up.  
  
"Get her!" they screamed. "She must die! Kill her!" A few of  
the corpses gained flesh and were armed with deadly looking  
swords. T'Lar ducked into an half destroyed alley. The corpses in  
it got up and grabbed her legs. Fortunately their scorched bodies  
were not strong. Arms splintered as they tried to hold onto her  
and bodies shattered as she stepped through them. T'Lar ducked to  
the left at the end of the alley, barely in time to miss a swiping  
blade at neck height. Fueled by the fear Dana's taunting and  
scorched corpses coming back to life around her, T'Lar sped up.  
  
All of a sudden the scenery changed. Dana's taunting voice  
disappeared. The buildings were less damaged and instead of dead,  
scorched corpses, there were half dead, burning living beings.  
T'Lar slowed to catch her breath. A man's hand reached up and  
caught her leg. "Help me!" he begged.  
  
"I can't, I have no medical equipment," T"Lar answered as  
logically cool as she could manage.  
  
"Help us, angel! Help us!" the writhing bodies begged. They  
started to close in on her.  
  
"I can't!" T"Lar shrieked.  
  
"Demon! She's no angel! No angel would ever dare to show her  
perfectly, untouched body to us! She's a demon! Kill her! Grab  
her!" Voices screamed around her. T'Lar started to run, but this  
time the bodies didn't crumble, and she stumbled. She managed  
barely to struggle back up from the grabbing hands and run into an  
alley. She was caught of guard as arms came out the walls,  
grabbing her, restraining her.  
  
"We've got her!" screamed the men and women horribly fused into  
the walls by the nuclear heat. "We've captured the demon!"  
Horribly burned men and women filled the alley from both sides.  
T'Lar struggled, hit, punched, and kicked. Everything to get away  
from them. But it was of no use. Soon they held her by each of her  
limbs in between them.  
  
"What should we do with the demon?" somebody asked.  
  
"I know!" someone screamed in reply. "We'll send her back to  
hell, where she came from!"  
  
"Yeah, Hell!"  
  
"To Hell with the demon."  
  
"Back to Hell!" The burned mob kept chanting as they walked,  
holding T'Lar in between them.  
  
When they had reached their destination, T'lar was set down and  
held tightly in place. To her horror she saw the ground opening  
up, revealing a stream of lava. The crowd kept chanting their  
'back to Hell' chants. T'Lar realized they were planning to throw  
her into the lava.  
  
"NO!" she screamed, as she struggled with all her might against  
her captors. "You can't do this, I'm not a demon! Let me go!"  
  
"So, how do you like my secret so far," Dana's voice cut  
through the noise. The laughter that followed was bone chilling.  
T'Lar saw her standing on the other side of the chasm. "You should  
have listened to me," Dana grinned. "Throw her in!"  
  
"Back to hell!" the crowd cheered and threw T'Lar in.  
  
"Noo!!" T'Lar screamed, flailing her arms in a futile attempt  
to fly. "AAAAAH!!!" T'Lar plunged into the lava . . .  
  
. . . and fell straight through, landing on a pavement with a  
painful smack. The city around her was untouched and eerily empty.  
  
T'Lar staggered to her feet. She placed the tips of her fingers  
against each other. "Control," she whispered and focused her mind.  
"There is only logic, only clarity."  
  
*Are you certain about that?* Dana's voice boomed all around  
her, penetrating her focus. The pavement filled with pictures of  
Dana's face. "This is my mind, T'Lar. There is no logic here, nor  
is there clarity." The faces laughed and then disappeared.  
  
As T'Lar shook off the disturbing vision, she became aware of  
crying in the distance. A part of her wanted to break the mind  
meld and flee, but logic dictated that she should find out what  
happened. She knew that she was responsible for unlocking this  
horrible version of her friend. If the memory she saw really  
happened . . . Perhaps she should never have opened the locked  
gate. She dismissed the thought; Dana needed to deal with it, not  
lock it away.  
  
T'Lar followed the sound. Rounding a few corners, she found a  
little girl sitting against the wall. Her face was buried in her  
arms that were lying on her knees. The girl was sobbing. T'Lar  
knelt beside her and in a soothing voice said, "Hello, I'm T"Lar.  
I won't hurt you."  
  
"I know who you are," the girl sobbed, and slowly looked up,  
tears cascaded down her puffy cheeks. "Why did you do it? I warned  
you, begged you not to. Why didn't you listen?"  
  
"Dana?" T'Lar said in astonishment. She had thought Dana was  
back there, somewhere.  
  
"Of course Dana, T'Lar. Logically, who else could it have  
been," Dana's cool logical voice sounded from T'Lar's left. She  
looked up and saw the Sally at, what T'Lar always considered, her  
best, cool and logical. Everything became clear to T'Lar.  
  
"You're shattered, when I unlocked that memory, you were  
shattered into different aspects of yourself," T'Lar said.  
  
"Correct, I'm logic, rationality, the part that thinks before  
it acts," Sally answered, coolly. "She is Innocence. Weakness.  
Naivete. Fear."  
  
"And the one you just met, is Insanity. Evil. Death.  
Destruction," the little girl whimpered. That the little girl told  
T'Lar, made it that much more gruesome.  
  
"When we experienced . . . nuclear weaponry, we could not  
handle it," Sally said. "We went insane, we considered ourselves  
and all like us to be monsters and demons. We proceeded with  
attempting to rid the world of all Immortals. Every Immortal we  
could find we killed, it did not matter to us, whether they were  
old, young, children of even babies, whether they could defend  
themselves or not, whether they knew what they were or not, or  
even whether they had died their First Death or not. We killed  
them all, we ripped babies from their mothers' arms, killed  
children on school grounds, killed people right in front of their  
loved ones. It took us thirty years to beat it down, now you have  
once again released that insanity."  
  
Then the girl interrupted, "We must hurry; she's coming. This  
time I won't be able to protect you. She wants to destroy you  
T'Lar, kill you. If she succeeds in destroying your mind, your  
Katra here . . . " the little girl shivered in fear, then turned  
to Sally. "I can't face her like this. Join us."  
  
"Logical. None of us can face her when we are apart, we  
wouldn't have enough strength," Sally stated, the next second a  
bland katana was imbedded in the wall, and the girl's head fell  
off.  
  
As Sally pulled the katana from the wall, T'Lar exclaimed in  
shock, "You killed her!"  
  
"Of course I did not kill her," Sally said with a raised eye  
brow. "We cannot die, remember." Just then, the body and head of  
the little girl disappeared in a tornado of electricity. The  
tornado slammed itself into Sally, then disappeared inside her.  
"See?" Sally asked.  
  
T'Lar shook herself and focused back on the issue at hand. "Why  
would Insane Dana want to kill me? What am I to her."  
  
Sally's eyebrow shot up, while a flicker of fear coursed  
through her eyes and she shivered. "Simple, T'Lar. As long as we  
are entangled in this mind meld, our bodies cannot do anything. If  
she were to kill you . . ."  
  
"She would be in control of this body, and she could do with it  
whatever she wants to," T'Lar realized.  
  
A laugh rang through the streets. Sally and T'Lar turned  
towards it. The blonde Dana from the memory stood there. She wore  
a long coat over a short mini-skirt. When she walked the top of  
her stockings could be seen, at times allowing a glimpse of her  
garters, her top showed ample cleavage. The blonde Dana swayed her  
hips overly suggestive when she walked. She placed her hands  
sensuously at her sides and puckered her bright, red lips. "That  
would be a sight to see, wouldn't it? Her on the rampage. I think  
from that day forward, Vulcan would depict Death as distinctly  
feminine." She laughed.  
  
"I take it you're Sexuality, Humor, Enjoyment," T'Lar said  
stated.  
  
"And a few other things," she answered with a flirtatious grin.  
  
"If we are to beat Insanity, we need to join together," Sally  
told the blonde.  
  
"Hmm," the blonde gave a throaty moan and caressed herself as  
she considered Sally's comment. She walked towards Sally. Her  
hands swept the contours of Sally's body before they came to rest  
around Sally's. "'Join together' has a nice ring to it," she said.  
  
Sally's eyebrows shot up. "I did not mean that in a sexual . .  
."  
  
"Oh, shut up, boring," blonde Dana whispered into Sally's ear  
before placing a kiss on Sally's lips. Then they merged. A  
redheaded Dana emerged wearing clothes that were a little more  
conservative than the blonde Dana; a demure blouse, knee-length  
skirt and high heeled shoes. She removed the katana from her coat,  
and smiled as she looked over the reflective blade. "This was my  
sword until it was destroyed in that nuclear fire. I think it's  
just been called for one final battle. Let's go, T'Lar, we've got  
insanity to beat."  
  
"Agreed," T'Lar answered.  
  
*****  



	2. Part 2

T'Lar and Dana walked through the city. The devastation  
increased as they neared the center.  
  
"What are we going to do when we find insanity?" T'Lar asked  
simply.  
  
"We fight her, and lock it all back up," Dana said without  
conviction.  
  
"No," T'Lar stated.  
  
"What, no?" Dana asked.  
  
"Not all of it, just her. I know now what's been eating at you.  
You have to deal with it, not lock it up again. If you lock it up  
it will only be a matter of time before something like this  
happens again," T'Lar explained.  
  
"You lock it up," Dana stated wearily.  
  
"No we don't. We may repress our emotions, but we do deal with  
them. We meditate on them, process all of it in the privacy of our  
thoughts and when a trauma is too much for us to handle, even we  
look up therapists," said T'Lar. "Something like this would  
definitely fit in the last description."  
  
"Oh, yes, I can see it now. 'Doctor, I got blown up in a  
nuclear fire, woke up without a scratch, went insane and proceeded  
to chop of the heads off of a lot Immortals.' I'll be in the loony  
bin faster than you can say 'snap, crackle and pop'," Dana  
answered her voice laced with sarcasm.  
  
"Your race has no therapists?" T'Lar asked astounded.  
Internally she processed Dana's remark. The meld made T'Lar  
understand Dana's cultural references easily.  
  
"We're usually busy chopping each other's heads off. That  
doesn't leave much room for therapists. 'Sit down my good man.  
What seems to be the problem?' 'Well, doc. There can be only one.'  
Swipe," Dana answered.  
  
"I see. That would pose a problem," T'Lar said. "I could teach  
you the meditation techniques and I could fulfill in a small  
manner the role of therapist. I haven't studied it, but know some  
of it and I can increase my knowledge in that area."  
  
"You would do that for me?" Dana asked, a bit taken aback.  
  
"Yes," T'Lar answered.  
  
A whimpering sound came from ahead. They saw a little boy  
sitting in the middle of the road, his face twisted away from  
them.  
  
"Hello, little one," T'Lar began, crouching so as not to appear  
threatening. "I'm not going to hurt you." The little boy slowly  
turned toward T'Lar. She saw something strange in his eyes. It was  
as if he was not a little boy.  
  
Something clicked inside Dana and suddenly understood. "T'Lar  
no!" she screamed as she grabbed her by the shoulders and pulled  
her away from the boy. The boy lashed out with a sword barely  
missing T'Lar's neck. Dana pulled her katana and quickly placed  
herself between T'Lar and the boy.  
  
"That was close, Dana," the boy sneered.  
  
"That's Kenny," Dana explained. "He was over 850 years old when  
I killed him. Makes people think he's a nice defenseless kid and  
then strikes when they least expect it."  
  
"Federal Agent, put down the swords. Now!" a voice ordered from  
a side street. Agent Dana Scully appeared from the shadows. Her  
gun trained on Dana. "What the hell?!" she blurted out as she  
recognized the target. "Who the hell are you?"  
  
"Help me, Agent Scully," Kenny whimpered as he took a few steps  
toward her, sword down. "The bad women wanted to hurt me."  
  
"Don't listen to him, he'll kill you," T'Lar stated evenly.  
  
"He's a little boy, you're two grown women. How could he be a  
threat to any of us? That makes him a lot more believable," Agent  
Dana asked. She quickly trained her gun on Kenny, who was now  
within striking distance. "Wait a minute. How do you know my  
name?"  
  
Kenny struck, but the bullets were faster. He jerked as the  
bullets struck him and dropped to the ground. The wounds  
disappeared rapidly and Kenny got back up.  
  
"You, stupid cunt. Bullets can't harm us," Kenny sneered before  
striking again.  
  
"That's not possible," Agent Scully muttered in shock as Kenny  
came at her. Then a sword flashed in front of her and Kenny's head  
came off. Agent Scully turned. With her gun pointing at Dana, she  
watched in shock as Kenny's body disappeared and slammed as energy  
into Dana's body.  
  
"I take it, she's your sense of Justice," T'Lar stated.  
  
"And my skepticism, among other things," Dana answered. With a  
stroke of the katana the gun hand of a too shocked to move Agent  
Scully came off. "Sorry about that," Dana said, "but I don't have  
time to explain." The next stroke went through Agent Scully's  
neck. With a blinding flash of light she disappeared into Dana's  
body.  
  
T'Lar picked up the gun and tested it, then nodded to Dana.  
"Now I have a weapon, it won't do much good, but every little bit  
will help," she said. Dana and T'Lar were about to continue when a  
Dana's voice sounded from behind them.  
  
"So you've come to lock me away again. I won't let you. I've  
been locked away for too long already," Evil Dana's voice said.  
Dana and T'Lar looked around and saw Evil Dana come straight out  
of the street. Arms folded across her chest as the asphalt rippled  
into Dana's form, before the grey matter turned into more familiar  
colors.  
  
"I'm going to put you away, for good this time," Dana answered  
grimly. The sky darkened and lightning started flash and thunder.  
The city waved and disappeared into flames. Each column of flame  
turned into an evilly grinning Immortal all brandishing swords.  
  
"I have an whole army at my side," Evil Dana said.  
  
"And you think I don't?" Dana asked. An army of grim, lighter  
Immortals appeared beside her.  
  
"Well, I guess this is it: Light versus Darkness. I should have  
known it would come to this," Evil Dana grinned.  
  
"Ready, T'Lar?" Dana whispered. T'Lar nodded. "Get them!" both  
Danas yelled and the two armies swept forward and locked in  
combat.  
  
Immortals fell left and right in the melee. A loser disappeared  
immediately into the victor with a blinding flash of light. T'Lar  
shot down enemy Immortals and they were promptly beheaded the  
allies. When she was out of bullets she pulled out a new clip from  
within her clothes as if by magic and replaced the old one.  
Quickly she realized that the other Immortals mattered not. Only  
the battle between the two Danas had any meaning. She ran toward  
them, shooting any Immortals that got in her way not caring  
whether they were on her side or not. T'Lar saw good Dana losing  
badly. She couldn't keep up with her stronger and faster  
counterpart. T'Lar aimed and fired. Evil Dana staggered back as a  
few bullets impacted in her body. Dana's sword went through Evil  
Dana's chest.  
  
"No! Not fair!" Evil Dana screamed with horror as T'Lar  
constructed a steel cage out of thin air. "Not again, I will not  
be locked away again!"  
  
"Quick!" T'Lar yelled at Dana. "Throw her in here!"  
  
Dana grabbed Evil Dana and threw her into the cage. Then T'Lar  
locked it, picked it up as if it weighed nothing and threw it in  
the air where it disappeared inside the lightning storm, which did  
the same not long after. Dana sighed in relief, before looking  
around at the melee that continued around her.  
  
"This ends now," Dana said, raising her arms. Then all the  
Immortals turned into energy and merged with her.  
  
*****  
  
T'Lar opened her eyes and saw a starry night. She looked over  
at Dana, sweaty and slumped forward in exhaustion. T'Lar gently  
laid her down.  
  
When Dana woke up, she saw a gentle fire crackling keeping the  
freezing cold of the desert night at bay. Dana looked at T'Lar  
with distrust in her eyes.  
  
"I am sorry," T'Lar said. "But I saw no other alternative. You  
would not talk to me about it."  
  
"Now you know what 'it' is," Dana said with resentment.  
  
"Indeed, I do," T'Lar said ever logical. "You understand this  
was necessary, do you not? You have been extremely agitated  
recently. It would have come out sooner or later. You were not  
dealing with your problem."  
  
"Yes, I know," Dana whispered as a tear left her eye.  
  
"Your mind is very powerful, albeit undisciplined. I could  
teach you a lot about using it, including those meditation  
techniques I talked about. I might even be able to teach you  
things that to my knowledge no non-Vulcan has ever performed, like  
the mind meld," T'Lar repressed the feeling the excitement she  
felt at the prospect.  
  
"Won't you need permission for that, from religious as well as  
secular leaders?" Dana asked tiredly. The ordeal had worn her out.  
  
"True. But I foresee no insurmountable obstacles."  
  
~~X~~  
  
Sela's mind was practically empty. There was nothing there but  
barren landscape. It was almost completely destroyed, when Selar  
and Soleta melded with her to obtain the knowledge they needed to  
stop Thul. Sela had burned out her own mind in order to keep them  
from obtaining it.  
  
Dana decided the best way to wake her up, was to shock whatever  
was left of Sela's mind to such a degree that it had no choice but  
to wake up. She started pouring the most horrifying images she  
could find. Images of death and destruction on an unimaginable  
scale; bows, arrows and pierced hearts, swords and people cut limb  
from limb, muskets and men perforated with leaden balls, men and  
women ripped apart by cannon balls, land mines shredding men's,  
women's and little children's legs into pieces, nuclear weapons  
going off burning down whole cities, her own memories of such a  
destruction and her insane actions following it, and finally, a  
few visions of survivors, luckily or deliberate, of the Four  
Horsemen.  
  
Had Sela been solely Romulan, she would have been dead a long  
time ago. But she was not, she was part Human. That part was  
programmed for survival at any cost. It would not except death  
easily, and so she had held on by a fragile thread. Humanity has  
evolved under the harshest of circumstances. Several asteroid  
impacts drove the Human species almost to extinction, indeed  
several lesser primate species had not survived at all. The final  
one happening around 9.500 BC meant the end of what is known as  
the Ice Age. Massive floods happened practically everywhere, as  
water levels rose one hundred and twenty meters. In other parts  
much needed water reservoirs dried up instantly, other parts of  
the world froze over just as quickly. Storms, the likes of which  
has never been seen since raged all over the world. Volcanic  
eruptions that made every eruption that came after look like small  
puffs in comparison, destroyed and created whole regions. In the  
midst of this hell hole the Human species evolved the ability to  
kill indiscriminately. They would happily roast a vanquished foe's  
baby on a nice crackling fire and eat it afterwards.  
  
It was this human part of Sela that responded first. The  
predator bred to survive at all costs, subdued by a mere few  
millennia of civilization, morals and ethics. It lashed out,  
wanting to join the carnage, to join in the killing and survive.  
It ignited a furnace of nuclear proportions inside her mind. It  
was a fire that outshone any her Romulan heritage could produce. A  
flame that could only be rivaled by the Vulcans. For the tiniest  
of moments the predator raged. It was long enough to force the  
rest of Sela's mind back into the realm of the living. And where  
the predator relished in death, Sela's higher, more sensitive  
parts could do but one thing: scream in utter horror and terror.  
  
In her weakened condition Sela had no defense against Dana's  
probe. She struggled, but Dana pushed her back down easily.  
*Looking for someone,* Dana blasted in Sela's mind. *An associate  
of Thul's, but always in the background, never assuming much, but  
always there.* Sela could not keep herself from remembering, Dana  
reviewed them all and zeroed in on a man always in the shadows,  
wearing a long hooded cloak that obscured his face. *Him, where  
can I find him?* Dana asked.  
  
*I won't tell!* Sela screamed trying to muster a defense.  
  
*Don't bother trying, girl. You don't stand a chance, but I'd  
much rather you cooperated. I have no interest in killing you,  
while getting the information,* Dana told Sela. Then she showed  
rather than told her what had happened and was happening all over  
the Alpha Quadrant, and the virus that was responsible. *If I  
don't find him, he gets to try again. And next time we might not  
find a cure in time, and then, all of us, including you and your  
precious Romulans will die. Where is he?!* Dana forced into Sela's  
mind.  
  
*Don't know,* Sela managed, despite her shock and weakened  
condition. *But I know who does. Guy owns a bar on Tritia, sector  
221-G.* The name of the city, that of the bar, their locations, a  
picture and name of the man flashed through Dana's mind.  
  
*****  
  
"Thank you," Dana said as she disengaged the mind meld. Sela  
gasped as she sat up with difficulty. "Can you walk?"  
  
Sela got off the bio bed and stood up. "Yes, it seems they've  
been taking good care of me. Just let me rest for a few moment."  
  
"Fine," Dana said, walked to the exit and tapped on the door.  
"You can open the door, I'm done."  
  
The nurse opened the door. As he looked at the standing Sela he  
muttered, "Wow, how did you manage that?"  
  
"You have no idea how good death is at bringing somebody back  
to life," Dana answered. When the nurse looked puzzled, she just  
gave him an enigmatic smile. "Get her some clothes, she's coming  
with me."  
  
"Uh, ma'am. I don't think she's allowed to leave. She has to  
stand trial and such."  
  
"You know about this virus that's going through the alpha  
quadrant?" Dana asked.  
  
"I've seen the news broadcasts," the man confirmed.  
  
"Well, then. Sela here can lead me to the guy who created the  
virus. If she's not with me, I might not reach him before he goes  
into hiding, and then he gets to try again," Dana said.  
  
"I'll get her some clothes," the nurse answered quickly, and  
turned around.  
  
"Well . . ." Dana began, but was interrupted. Now that there  
was only one person she had to get past, Sela decided to make a  
break for it. Dana grabbed her by her throat and kept her from  
going any further. "What the hell do you think your doing?" she  
asked.  
  
"What does it look like?" Sela spat.  
  
Dana sighed and muttered, "Romulans, far too impulsive for  
their own good." She pulled Sela out of the room and placed her  
face against the window in the corridor. A nice view of the stars  
greeted her. "What were you going to do, huh? Jump out, completely  
naked and hope your momentum carries you over light years of  
distance before you freeze to death?" Sela gulped. "I didn't think  
so," Dana said exasperated, and let go of Sela.  
  
The nurse returned with clothes. They were light brown with  
blue lines. He handed them to Sela, who started towards the room  
she had just come from. Dana held her back with her left hand. "No  
time, change right here."  
  
Sela looked at the nurse for a moment, before he turned around.  
  
*****  
  
The Enterprise  
In pursuit of virus distributer  
  
"The ship has rendez-voused with a larger one, sir," Data said.  
  
"All stop," Picard ordered. "Data, what can you make of this  
ship?"  
  
"It reads as a Thallonian light cruiser. One hundred twenty-one  
meters in length, thirty-three meters in width, medium shields and  
armament. No threat to the Enterprise, sir."  
  
"The Thallonian Empire is gone, they must have bought, or  
stolen one of their ships. Any sign of the virus?" Picard asked.  
  
"There are quantities of the virus concentrated in the back of  
the ship, most likely in the cargo bay. There are signs that there  
was a lot more until recently," Data said.  
  
"Do you think this is their main ship?" Picard asked.  
  
"Highly unlikely, sir," Data answered. "I would guess this is  
ship was also used for distribution of the virus."  
  
"Understood, Data. I guess now we wait," Picard said.  
  
"Sir, the ship just went into high warp on a course heading  
toward sector 221-G," Data stated.  
  
"Helm, follow that ship, match it's course and speed. Keep us  
at a good distance," Picard ordered.  
  
"Aye, sir."  
  
*****  
  
The Golden Eagle  
On route toward Tritia  
  
"So," Dana began, looking at Sela, while trying to figure her  
out. "You didn't like my images of death, or did you? Especially  
not those of children dying."  
  
"Of course not. Who would?" Sela answered defensively.  
  
"Yet, you joined a conspiracy to kill every living being in the  
Federation: old, young, children and babies would have died if  
Thul and you had succeeded," Dana said, studying Sela's  
expressions.  
  
Sela closed her eyes. Guilt, that she couldn't understand,  
suddenly washed over her. She pushed it away and said nothing.  
  
"Which is strange considering that most Romulans would balk at  
the mere thought of doing what you were involved in. They wouldn't  
just consider it a highly dishonorable act, they would be  
disgusted by it. Strange that your Romulan bred honor would go  
along with such a plan," Dana said to Sela, seeing her expression  
jump from rage, to guilt, to pride and back. Dana continued before  
Sela could reply. "Oh, I forgot. Honor, regrettably, is something  
that only the common man in the Romulan Empire still considers  
important . . . and since your father is one of those in power,  
you were never taught honor, right?"  
  
"I have honor," Sela spat in rage.  
  
"Then why did you do it? Why go along with a plan, that would  
make three quarters of the Romulan population demand you'd be  
executed? I mean, what you and the rest of that rogue faction were  
party to was evil. Even most of the dishonorable bastards in  
command of the Romulan Empire thought it was too disgusting to be  
party to. So only the most evil ones had to do it in secret," Dana  
said.  
  
Sela averted her eyes.  
  
"I think, I know why you did it. Would you like to hear my  
theory?" Dana asked sweetly.  
  
"No," Sela answered forceful.  
  
"All right then. I think you wanted to wipe out every last  
remaining reminder of your mother," Dana said calmly.  
  
"My mother has nothing to do with it! My mother means nothing  
to me. I consider her as noting more than the womb that carried  
me, a walking breeding tank, nothing more!" Sela screamed in  
anger.  
  
"Yes, I know. Every Federation Ambassador is given a psyche  
profile on anyone Starfleet considers a threat in a diplomatic  
crisis. That includes you," Dana answered with a small, wicked  
smile. "But if she really meant nothing to you; why are you so  
angry?"  
  
"My mother spit on my father's benevolence. He saved her life  
and that of her crew and she betrayed him. I hate her for that!"  
Sela spat at Dana.  
  
"Oh, so she is important to you. Very important indeed, if  
you hate her," Dana grinned, then continued as she saw Sela's  
angry, but surprised look. "But do you really believe your father  
was benevolent? 'Hey, babe, you're hot. You marry me and become my  
obedient concubine and I'll spare your crew and yourself. If not  
I'll kill you all. What do you say?' If you consider that  
benevolent, you've got a strange definition of that word. And if  
you think that your mother married your father of her own free  
will, after falling in love with him, because he blew up her ship  
and told them, 'I'll spare your lives no matter what', and then  
betrayed your oh so good father to the Federation, you're sadly  
mistaken."  
  
Sela grimaced as Dana hit a nerve.  
  
"You said everything Human inside you died the moment you  
realized she was taking you away from your father. Are you certain  
about that, or is that just what you grew into remembering? Is it  
something you fabricated to fill in the gaps in your memory, long  
after your upbringing colored the perception of your memories?"  
Dana asked. Sela said nothing as she mulled over Dana's words.  
When no answer came, Dana continued, "You see I find it rather  
strange, that a child has such clear and correct memories of such  
a confusing time. Your mother pulls you out of your bed in the  
middle of the night, you cry and scream that you don't want to  
leave your father. Your mother is killed. So much confusion in  
such a short period of time."  
  
"Trust me, that's the way it was," Sela answered..  
  
"Trust a wily Romulan? I think not," Dana said. "Now I think  
this is what happened: your mother pulls you out of your bed and  
takes you away. You realize you're not coming back. Your lovely  
house, your friends, as well as your father will all be gone. So  
you do what most small children do. First you whine. 'Mommy, why  
do we have to go?' Your mother tells you to close your mouth and  
that you'll understand soon enough. You don't understand and so  
you throw a tantrum and scream. Your mother and you are captured  
and brought to your father. You're locked inside your room and  
hear your father beat and yell at your mother, and you feel  
extremely guilty, if you hadn't thrown your tantrum, your father  
would not be hurting your mother. You wake up the next morning  
only to watch your mother get executed. You cry and cry, guilt  
overwhelms you. Your father yells and screams at you to shut up.  
So you shut up. The only way to do that though is to shut down.  
The overwhelming guilt kills your Human side, burying part of your  
memories with it."  
  
Sela had never felt anything like what she was feeling now. The  
mix of emotions was barely distinguishable. Guilt, fear, anger,  
and sadness were the most pronounced. Flashes of memory than she  
didn't think she had, had shot through her mind, triggered by  
Dana's reconstruction. With extreme difficulty she managed to  
suppress them, not wanting to deal with them or even know where  
they came from. Dana looked on in sympathy but did nothing. What  
was important was that Sela regain her Humanity.  
  
"That's not what happened," Sela stated, but not very  
convincingly. "Besides that's irrelevant now. My Human side is  
dead, and once something is dead, it'll stay that way."  
  
"Are you certain about that?" Dana asked her with an enigmatic  
grin. "I've got this nasty experience, that just when you're  
positive they're dead, Humans tend to come back to life."  
  
"What the hell are you talking about?" Sela asked confused.  
  
*If you'd only knew,* Dana grinned to herself. "It's in our  
legends and myths you see. Zombies, Vampires and eaters of the  
golden apples, just a quick pick from a list that goes on and on.  
Myths that seem to be based on certain truths, more than once  
someone wakes up in his own coffin, just about to be lowered in  
their grave. Humans who died of a drug overdose, and were already  
blue in the face, opening their eyes on the autopsy table, just as  
the mortician was about to perform the autopsy. Humans in comas,  
that by all rights should be dead, waking up. And even in  
extremely rare cases a Human that was brain dead, coming back to  
life without aid. Humans have this uncanny ability to come back  
from the dead, when you least expect them to. Resurrect themselves  
from even the most impossible situations. I've got a feeling that  
that's what your Human side is doing now, busy resurrecting  
itself. In the last couple of hours, haven't you felt strange,  
conflicted, emotionally unstable?"  
  
"I woke up from a coma," Sela said as explanation after a  
pause. She sounded as if trying to convince herself more than  
Dana.  
  
"You just keep telling yourself that, but you'll never believe  
it," Dana said. "Aren't you wondering why you aren't dead yet? Why  
you survived your burn out technique?"  
  
"No," Sela said.  
  
"Too bad, because I'm going to tell you anyway," Dana grinned  
at Sela. "You see I was there when you were practically brain dead  
and I felt what dragged your mind out of the abyss. It was  
primitive, deadly, a predator and it wanted to join in the  
violence I showed you . . . it was Human. It's the remnant of a  
time, when Humans evolved under the most deadly of circumstances.  
Something conditioned to survive at all costs. It'll kill anything  
that it considers a threat or food. It's inside of every Human,  
veiled beneath several millennia of evolution and layers of moral  
and ethical codes it lies dormant, waiting to be released. If you  
push the right buttons on a Human, force him or her to a point  
where survival becomes critical, that predator will be released .  
. . and the Human will turn into your worst nightmare. It will  
kill until it's satisfied and sometimes it never gets satisfied.  
That part I felt stirring, that part kept your mind on the edge,  
that part woke up and it dragged the rest of your mind, Romulan  
and Human out into the open. Now that your human side has been  
stirred, I've got a feeling it will resurrect itself. It is doing  
that as we speak, and it will not be denied."  
  
"I don't believe you," Sela said. Disbelief coloured her voice.  
She had felt it. It was stirring inside her. It scared her  
witless.  
  
"Oh? Why again did you help an insane man wipe out the entire  
Federation population? An act considered dishonorable by virtually  
all Romulans?" Dana needled. "Perhaps you should think about  
everything I said, and everything you've done in the past years."  
  
"I know why I did it. I was doing it so you wouldn't do it  
first," Sela grinned, thinking she had her.  
  
"We would never do such a thing," Dana said with conviction.  
  
"You did before, you tried to wipe us out," Sela said smugly.  
  
"No we did not. I realize that that is a half-truth that's been  
sold to you," Dana said, thinking how best to proceed. "Although  
it was humans that tried to wipe you out, they were not us. They  
were our enemies, and we thought we had destroyed them all. Sadly  
we were mistaken and they found the Romulans."  
  
"I don't believe you," Sela said.  
  
"Really? Why do you think the common Romulan and Human knows  
nothing of this attack, hmm? Why do only those in Romulan  
intelligence know about it? And even then, just that we attacked  
first, no details other than that we used a virus? Why haven't the  
Romulan authorities ever used that fact against us, hmm? And if we  
had such a deadly virus, why haven't we used it again? Why did the  
Romulans vie for peace when we were so dangerous, why didn't you  
fight to the bitter end, especially since you were anything but  
beaten? And why did you use a strategy of faking that you had no  
warp drive, a strategy that could only have worked against a  
little less, advanced enemy? Answer those questions," Dana said,  
making sure not to reveal to much.  
  
Sela was frustrated. First Ambassador Scully, as she had  
introduced herself, questioned Sela's nature with arguments that  
she could not dismiss. Now the ambassador was shattering her sense  
of what was real and what not. "I can't answer them," Sela  
reluctantly admitted. "But I don't believe you."  
  
"I can't give you the answers, I don't know you well enough to  
trust you with this secret. And, quite frankly, I don't know  
whether you're worthy of knowing it," Dana said. "But," Dana  
decided to add, "I can send you to someone. Someone, who is a  
better judge of your character."  
  
"Ha! Like who, a Starfleet Admiral?" Sela asked sarcastically.  
  
"No, his name is Palek."  
  
Sela looked at Dana startled. Could she have guessed and got  
lucky on the name. Somehow Sela doubted it. "What has the first  
head of the Tal Shiar got to do with anything?"  
  
"I see they haven't told you everything. How long has the Tal  
Shiar existed?"  
  
"Thirty years," Sela answered without hesitation.  
  
"No, the Tal Shiar has existed for about two hundred and eighty  
years. Palek was not the first head either, he was the third,"  
Dana answered simply.  
  
"You're lying!"  
  
"Am I? Go ask Palek, he'll tell you that I told you the truth,"  
Dana said without any hint of irritation. It bothered Sela. Dana  
was too calm for such an elaborate lie.  
  
"I don't know where he is, hardly anyone does," Sela answered  
befuddled.  
  
"Room 156 of the Imperial Hospital in Shavrak. He's about ready  
to die of old age, but he still manages to hold on. I doubt he'll  
survive the next year, so if you're planning to go ask him, you  
better be quick . . . Oh, one more thing, if you want him to tell  
you anything make sure you say to him this word: 'Purity'," Dana  
said, stressing the last sentence. "You got that?"  
  
"Yes," Sela answered.  
  
"Repeat it, 'Purity'," Dana said in a stern voice.  
  
"'Purity'," Sela repeated, shocked at the turn of events.  
  
"Good, remember it," Dana mused, dropping the Golden Eagle out  
of warp. "Tritia," Dana stated. "We're here. I take it you can  
arrange passage for yourself to wherever you want to go?"  
  
Sela looked at Dana astounded. How could she know where Palek  
lay? Was she indeed telling the truth? Sela had a feeling she was.  
To top it off, the Ambassador was now simply letting her go.  
"You're letting me go?" she asked in confusion.  
  
"Why not? Should you stand trial? I don't think so. You have no  
idea of your potential, but I've got a feeling you soon will,"  
Dana answered.  
  
*****  
  
The Enterprise  
On the border of sector 221-G  
  
"The ship has entered a small nebula. The sensors no longer  
pick up the ship or the homing device, sir," Data said. "They  
effectively went inside the rabbit hole," Data added with smile.  
  
Riker and Deanna shared a smile while Picard asked, "Is it  
possible they know we're following it?"  
  
"The ship does have better sensors, they could have detected  
the homing signal," Data said. "They might have thought the  
release of the smuggler's ship from a planet in quarantine  
suspicious."  
  
"This could also be their standard operating procedure to make  
sure no one is following them," Riker suggested.  
  
"Or the nebula could be their base of operations," Data  
speculated.  
  
"If we get any closer they'll be certain someone is following  
them, sir," Deanna supplied.  
  
"Yes," Picard nodded, thinking it over. "Mr. Fowley, contact  
the Excalibur."  
  
"Aye, sir," Mr. Fowley stated.  
  
A few moments later the screen showed the bridge of the  
Ambassador class USS Excalibur and a haggard looking captain  
MacKenzie Calhoun. Sweat poured down his brow, and sores covered  
his hands and face. "What is it, Picard? We're busy trying to save  
all our lives, I don't have much time . . . Wait a minute, you  
seem rather healthy," Calhoun answered a bit annoyed.  
  
"We've been inoculated," Picard answered, tapping his  
communicator. "Sickbay, can you transmit the cure to the  
Excalibur."  
  
"Yes, sir," came nurse Ogawa's reply.  
  
"You already have the cure?" Calhoun said with angry  
astonishment. "Why haven't we been given it."  
  
"Because this won't work very well, we can hardly start  
inoculating billions of people one by one," Picard explained while  
he stood up and walked a little closer to the view screen. "The  
doctors are now busy making it suitable for mass distribution."  
  
"Understood," Calhoun said. He turned to look at Lieutenant  
Lefler for confirmation of transmission. She nodded and relayed  
the message to their sickbay.  
  
"I see you have two new, passengers," Picard said, nodding  
toward a relatively young woman and equally young man standing on  
the bridge. They seemed worried. They had the distinctive edge of  
people who wanted to help, but could do nothing to them.  
  
"Yes, that would be my son, Xion and Si Cwan's former missing  
sister Kalinda," Calhoun said turning back to face the view  
screen, keeping his emotions carefully concealed.  
  
"I didn't know you had a son," Picard blurted out surprised.  
  
"Well, I have. So why did you contact me?" Calhoun asked.  
"You're not going to tell me this is a social call, is it?"  
  
"We're in pursuit of a ship responsible for distributing the  
virus, we think it may lead us to the person responsible for  
creating this virus," Picard said. "If we want to keep them from  
trying again; we must catch them now."  
  
"I see," Calhoun said, stroking his chin in thought.  
  
"They're going for Sector 221-G. We placed a homing beacon on  
the ship, but they've entered a nebula that our sensors cannot  
penetrate. They already know we're following them, suspect  
somebody is following them, this is their standard procedure to  
ensure nobody is following them, or this is their base of  
operations," Picard explained quickly.  
  
"If you go in you'll be detected. I take it since my ship  
belongs in 221-G you want me to check if they're coming out on my  
side?" Calhoun asked with a bloodthirsty smile. "All right, send  
me the frequency of the homing signal, and we'll get too it."  
  
Picard turned to Fowley. Fowley nodded and started transmitting  
the information. Picard turned back to the main screen and said,  
"Captain, if the ship hasn't left the nebula in half an hour on  
either of our sides I'm taking the Enterprise inside."  
  
"I'll be right there beside you, Picard," Calhoun answered,  
then turned around and looked at Lefler. She nodded when she  
received the data. The door opened and someone from medical  
entered carrying a hypospray. Calhoun turned back around.  
"Captain, wherever the ship is going, I'm accompanying you 'cause  
I want this bastard. If get my hands on him . . ." Calhoun let his  
sentence hang.  
  
"Understood, Calhoun," Picard said, returning Calhoun's grim  
smile. "I'm looking forward to working with you again. Picard  
out."  
  
*****  
  
Tritia  
The Laughing Korka Bar  
  
Dana and Sela walked through the entrance. "OK, so where is  
he?" Dana asked, Looking around the three-quarters-full, sleazy  
bar. A large stage occupied a portion of the room. It was  
obviously for the stripteases advertized outside. Individuals from  
many species were inside; some playing cards at one table, others  
conversing in shadowy corners, and others just sitting at one of  
two bars sipping their drinks. Here and there a skimpy clad female  
waited on the mostly male clientele.  
  
"That one, the Kriak, his name is Chalook," Sela said, pointing  
to a huge individual with grey skin and spikes on the contours of  
his face.  
  
"Good, now you can leave if you want," said Dana, her eyes  
narrowed dangerously.  
  
"I think I'll stick around, I'd like to see what you're going  
to do against his guards," Sela said, grinning a sadistic smile as  
she folded her hands in front of her. Dana ignored her comment and  
walked purposefully toward her target.  
  
Chalook, recognized Sela and knew what the human female had  
come for. While the small human woman was not a threat he sent his  
two best guards to deal with her; a huge half-naked purple horn  
covered creature with a couple of vicious canines and a slow  
menacing Gorn unbreakable and strong.  
  
"That's far enough, little girl," the purple alien said, as he  
placed an enormous hand on Dana's chest in warning.  
  
Dana let her gaze move upward to his face, then slowly, but  
deliberately said, "Take your hand off of me . . ."  
  
The purple alien laughed, interrupting Dana and said, "Or what?  
You're going to beat me?"  
  
"No," Dana said with a steel voice, her eyes boring into the  
beast's skull. "You're going to take your hand off of me . . . or  
I'm going to take your hand off of you."  
  
The alien looked at her for a moment then a grin spread across  
his face. "Listen to this," he said, turning his head to look at  
his Gorn companion that was only now arriving at his companion's  
position, "She's goi . . ."  
  
He didn't get any further than that. He felt his arm being  
twist and the little woman moving underneath it. He screamed as he  
felt something sharp move through his wrist. The pain forced him  
to his knees, and felt his arm being let go. After turning his arm  
in his field of vision he stared in horror at his severed wrist.  
Turning around he saw his hand lying on the floor. He picked it up  
in shock and started to sob. He heard his companion emit an ear  
splitting roar that quickly dissipated into a gurgle. Turning the  
purple alien saw his companion grab his slit throat and in true to  
Gorn form, slowly keeling over and land in his own blood. The  
small woman, now holding a frightening, gleaming, gently curved  
sword, didn't even give his dead Gorn friend a glance. Through his  
tears the purple, former menacing alien saw the patrons start to  
get up and leave. Some of them in fear, others calmly, just to  
make sure they weren't around when the police arrived.  
  
Reacting to their companions' quick dispatch other guards  
sprung into action. Dana sliced her sword through an Orion's  
abdomen, spilling his guts on the floor. She picked his pistol  
from its holster before he even hit the floor. The thug tried to  
put his intestines back into his body before landing in them. Two  
more guards fired there disrupters at her, but in their haste at  
the sudden situation missed. They got partially vaporized for  
their troubles, leaving a few pieces -- half an arm here, a foot  
there, a piece of their torso's next to those covered in molten  
sludge that had been their bodies mere seconds earlier on the  
floor.  
  
The final guard that put up resistence was a another purple  
alien. "You hurt my brother, you bitch," he yelled and fired his  
pistol at her. After ducking beneath the shot, she kicked the  
disrupter from his hand, then with a slice his left hand came of.  
  
"There," Dana said, friendly. "Now you've got a matching pair."  
  
The five bouncers that were left, strewn over the bar to guard  
it against bad clients, looked at each other for a moment, then  
started walking off. "Come back here, you cowards!" Chalook yelled  
as he saw them leave, starting to get nervous, when he realized  
the only thing standing between him and the psycho bitch was a one  
handed unarmed guard.  
  
Unlike his brother, the severing of his hand only enraged this  
guard and he charged at Dana. She jumped aside and up on a table,  
which caused the patron that had decided to stay and loot the  
chips still left on tables to startle. He held onto his loot as  
best as he could as he ran toward one of the exits. Now that Dana  
was high enough, she let her sword slice through purple alien's  
neck. Yellow, almost fluorescent blood spurted up from the  
headless corpse as it dropped to the floor. The severed head  
joined it a few moments later.  
  
Chalook looked on in terror as the small human woman  
effortlessly bested his guards. He decided not to use the  
disrupter in his trembling hands but to follow his surviving  
employees example and flee. Dana caught his movement out of the  
corner of her eye and jumped over a table towards the fleeing  
Chalook. She kicked both her feet against his cheek sending him  
crashing to the floor. He struggled to get away succeeding only to  
find himself pinned up against a wall.  
  
"So, you're Chalook," Dana said, standing above him. Chalook  
looked up at her. He could not help but wonder why she suddenly  
seemed so much bigger. "There's a man you know, always in robes  
and a hood. The faceless one, I want to know where he is."  
  
"I can't tell, he'll kill me," Chalook answered shivering in  
fear.  
  
"And what do you think I'm going to do?" Dana asked, then bent  
forward placing her face mere inches from his. In a deadly low  
voice she added, "Give you a blowjob?"  
  
"Eh, no," Chalook trembled.  
  
"That's a start. Now what did he promise you, huh? You can rule  
this planet? Or even part of the Alpha Quadrant? Hmm?" A flicker  
in his eyes betrayed that she had guessed right. "Too bad for you  
the only place your going to rule it from is the after life,  
because, dickweed, he lied to you; he's not interested in  
conquering anything. The only thing he wants, is to kill every  
living thing in the Galaxy. You and all your loved ones included,  
if you have any."  
  
"I don't believe you."  
  
"Believe her," Sela cut in. Dana turned her head to look at  
Sela. Sela seemed a bit ill at ease. "I didn't believe her at  
first either, I thought it was just a ploy to get me to roll over  
on Thul. But when she gave me free access to communications and  
the news broadcasts . . . Trust me, this guy wants to kill  
everything."  
  
Chalook looked at Sela for a moment, not sure what to say. He  
felt a hand grab his collar and push him against the wall.  
Something cold and metallic touched his throat. His eyes shifted  
back to focus on the deadly human.  
  
"Listen, I'm going to make this easy for you. You tell me where  
he is, and you, one, get to live, two get to stop a mad man from  
killing you, your children . . . nah, any family you may have, and  
everyone else in the galaxy. And finally, three, you get to avoid  
me torturing you to death or until you give me the information. I  
think I'll start by slicing your toes in half, and then removing  
whatever remains, after which I'll start cutting off the genitalia  
you've got on your knees, slice by millimeter thin slice. Now,  
what will it be?" Once she finished, Dana removed her katana from  
his throat and placed it near his feet before starting to untie  
his shoes.  
  
"I'll tell, I'll tell. Don't. OK?" Chalook blurted out. His  
hands clenched his shoes in an effort to keep them on.  
  
Dana stopped and smiled. "Good boy," she said.  
  
*****  
  
Captain Jacko Kilari, an Orion pirate and all around criminal,  
sat in his command chair looking pensive at the stars shooting by.  
His lips pressed together as he willed the ship to move even  
faster. It had been bad when Jarro arrived on his ship infected  
with the disease. It had been worse locking him in a room and  
letting him die as they waited inside the nebula to check if any  
Starfleet vessels were following. He had been suspicious when they  
had let him break quarantine, but when no Starfleet vessel arrived  
he figured they were letting everybody go since everybody was  
already infected.  
  
What went wrong Jacko thought? Was the vaccine dose not high  
enough? They all should be immune, yet his crew was sick and so  
was he. Sweat poured off his body, while he shivered with cold His  
limbs ached, his bones hurt, and sores covered his skin. He  
coughed repeatedly.  
  
Up ahead he saw a ship. He teeth clenched in a macabre grin.  
Finally he thought, the ship of The Hood. That was the only way  
they knew him, no one had even seen his face, it was always  
covered by a hood. Relief washed through him as he saw the ship.  
It was six times the size of Jacko's, it's jagged edges and  
sloping belly gave it a menacing air. Almost in trance he ordered  
his crew to pull his ship along side. He got up and walked towards  
his transporter room.  
  
He beamed over and started navigating the winding corridors of  
the ship as fast as he possibly could with the pain lancing  
through his body. He went straight towards The Hood's room. He was  
apprehensive about the meeting. He was tried to formulate  
questions to ask that did not sound to critical.'Was the dose not  
high enough, sir?' 'Did the virus mutate, sir?' 'Were we injected  
with the wrong substance, sir?' 'Have you any idea why the cure  
isn't working on us, sir?' He had no desire to anger The Hood. He  
still remembered The Hood's little demonstration of superiority. A  
few of the crew had decided to mutiny, to take over the whole  
operation by themselves. They had attacked The Hood from behind  
and stuck a knife in his ribs. Then, when everyone thought he was  
dead, he had proven that he was always one step ahead of everybody  
else by simply pulling out the knife from some protective piece of  
clothing or armor - The Hood had never bothered to show them what  
it was exactly - and then killing the conspirators with their own  
weapon. Afterwards he had stated that no one would defy him and  
live to tell about it.  
  
When Jacko reached the door to The Hood's inner sanctum, he  
paused to catch his breath and steady himself. He squared his  
shoulders and stepped through the door. The inner sanctum was  
large. The doors in the far wall lead to more private quarters and  
a bedroom. The sanctum was cave-like. Its walls were lined with  
computers and screens, allowing The Hood to operate his empire and  
the distribution of the virus from this single room. The room  
contained nothing else but a desk and a chair. There was nowhere  
to hide. The Hood could always see you. The Hood stood in front of  
his desk, back turned towards Jacko.  
  
"Sir," Jacko said accompanied by a groan of pain. "The cure  
does not seem to work."  
  
The Hood laughed and slowly turned around. He pulled his hood  
back, revealing a human face with Mediterranean features and said,  
"What cure?"  
  
"I don't understand," Jacko asked.  
  
"All right. Let's put it this way. There never has been and  
never will be a cure. And I must thank you for coming on board,  
this means I don't have to bother releasing the virus here," the  
Hood said with an eery laugh.  
  
"You god-damned bastard, you betrayed us!" Jacko yelled. He  
pulled his phaser in reflex and fired.  
  
The phaser blast hit The Hood, but it only made him laugh  
harder. "You can't kill me!" he screamed. "I'm indestructible! But  
you will all die! The virus will kill every living thing in the  
galaxy!" He cackled.  
  
Suddenly everything became clear to Jacko. The Hood had not  
been wearing protective gear. The knife had really gone into The  
Hood's body. It just could not kill him. "Except you, and others  
like you . . . if there are," Jacko stammered in understanding.  
  
"Exactly!" The Hood screamed happily. Pain lanced through  
Jacko's body and he dropped to his hands and knees. He became  
angry.  
  
"Well, little man, it's time to die," the Hood said, grinning.  
  
Jacko pushed the phaser to maximum. "If I'm going to die, I'm  
going to take you with me!" he screamed. With all the strength he  
could muster he raised the phaser, and fired it continuously. The  
Hood winced at the hit, but then straightened and laughed. *You're  
going to die!* Jacko thought determined. The pains became worse.  
He felt like he was falling apart, but he resisted the urge to lie  
down. He kept the phaser trained on the laughing Hood and with  
every ounce of strength he could drag up out of his tortured body  
he kept firing. With satisfaction he saw how The Hood stop  
laughing and start to groan in pain. Then after a few more seconds  
he saw The Hood's robes ignite, leaving a large gaping hole and  
melted flesh beneath. Jacko released the trigger. A contented grin  
graced his features as he watched The Hood drop dead to the floor.  
A spasm of pain caused Jacko to convulse. He fell convulsing to  
the floor. He screamed again and again, while the sores burst open  
and showered him in his own blood.  
Chapter 4: Death and Life  
  
"It seems you found him," Dana said through the commlink.  
  
"Indeed, we did. One of the distributors was still on Rania, we  
followed him," Picard explained.  
  
Before he could continue, Dana asked, "Where is he?"  
  
"In our morgue. It seems once one of his captains found out he  
had no interest in letting anyone live, the captain killed him."  
Picard wondered how the Ambassador managed to get here so fast.  
"How did you find this place anyway?"  
  
"I've got a feeling you don't want know. You don't mind if I  
take a look at him, do you?" Dana asked.  
  
"You afraid he's coming back from the dead," Picard asked  
bemused.  
  
"I just want to see him," Dana said.  
  
*****  
  
The buzz was unmistakable, if subdued as a result of his  
'death'. Nurse Ogawa opened the drawer and removed the sheet that  
covered the man's face. "Diego," Dana whispered in recognition to  
soft for Ogawa to hear.  
  
~~X~~  
  
2246  
USS Spartacus  
Standard Orbit around Garca III  
  
Captain's Log Supplemental: We've arrived at Garca III, the  
origin of the strange sub-space signals. It is as if someone built  
half a transmitter. From orbital scans it seems the inhabitants  
have a primitive agrarian society, which means that the signal is  
not native to the planet. Minerals in the nearby mountain range  
are keeping us from pinpointing the exact position from which the  
signal is originating. An investigation is underway.   
  
*****  
  
The golden sparkles slowly disappeared as four humans in native  
clothing appeared. The humans used hoods and bulky clothing to  
hide their faces in hopes of blending in with the local  
population.  
  
"That way," said the woman in the lead position while pointing  
to their right after consulting her black tricorder. The group  
started moving. The dense foliage of forest made for slow  
progress. After half an hour they arrived at a crash site of a  
warp capable shuttle craft. Most of it was mangled against a  
mountain side.  
  
"You think it's repairable?" Dana asked the engineer of the  
away team.  
  
"Nah, this one is ready for the scrapheap," replied Chief  
Engineer Machnemerra.  
  
Lieutenant Iesaian went into the craft with some difficulty.  
"No wonder we received these strange signals. Whoever made this,  
must have cannibalized every system onboard the shuttle. The only  
thing that's operating here is this transmitter and some  
rudimentary sensors, just enough to detect something in orbit . .  
. I think it's radar."  
  
Dana put hand against the shuttle and leaned into the craft and  
scanned the blinking lights. She stepped back and looked at the  
roof of the shuttle. A cable went all the way up the mountain  
slope. She consulted her tricorder again and said, "Yep, radar."  
  
"Captain," Lieutenant Commander Jarod Barsby said. "This ship  
must have been lying here for at least fifty years. If whoever  
crash landed here is human, he's ready to keel over from old age,  
if he hasn't already."  
  
"Understood," Dana answered, looking around for a moment. "Find  
anything else?" she asked. When no one answered she ordered,  
"Sahak, turn off that equipment."  
  
"Aye, sir," Iesian answered from inside the craft. A couple of  
seconds later he came crawling out of the craft.  
  
"Let's go check out the nearest village, shall we?" Dana asked.  
The men agreed and started walking in the direction of the  
village.  
  
*****  
  
"What do you think?" Dana asked, peering through the bushes  
down into the village. "Can we pass for these people or do we need  
to beam back up and improve our disguise?"  
  
"I think we can pull it off," Jarod said.  
  
"Good, let's go then," Dana said, stood up, and started walking  
toward the small village.  
  
The first person who saw them in the village hurried by without  
interest. The second looked at them but quickly continued on his  
way and ducked into a house.  
  
"Is it just me, or is something seriously wrong here?" Chief  
Brian Machnemerra asked in apprehension.  
  
"It isn't you," Dana said. Suddenly she froze as totally  
unexpected the buzz that signaled a nearby Immortal assaulted her  
senses. She looked around and saw a man with a Spanish complexion  
step out of a house. His face lid up. It was as if a whole world  
had been lifted off his shoulders.  
  
"Oh, thank god!" he exclaimed running towards them. "You've  
arrived just in time!"  
  
"Just in time for what?" Barsby asked.  
  
"To help save these people. They're dying of a disease. I've  
tried everything I could think of, but I can't stop it," the man  
said.  
  
"Shall we discuss this in some privacy?" Dana suggested.  
  
"Of course, of course," the man answered, hastily turned and  
gestured them towards the house he had just come out of. "Come  
into my home."  
  
Once in the privacy of the man's home Dana said, "I'm Captain  
Anna Drury of the Federation Starship Spartacus. This is my second  
officer Lieutenant Commander Jarod Barsby, Chief Engineer Brian  
Machnemerra and Lieutenant Sahak Iesaien."  
  
"I'm Diego Rivadeneira and among others my wife is sick," Diego  
said pointing at the door to the bedroom. "You will help her?  
Yes?"  
  
Dana and her crew shared a look.  
  
*****  
  
Two hours later  
Dana's Ready Room  
  
"Why will you not help!?" Diego screamed in rage, smashing his  
fist on the small desk that separated him and Dana.  
  
"I've explained to you the Prime Directive . . ." Dana started.  
  
"They are the laws of mortals, they have no bearing on us. It's  
your duty as a fellow Immortal. We should stick together,"  
exclaimed Diego. He had put all his hopes on the woman in front of  
him. He felt caged in her small office.  
  
Dana snorted, "We have no loyalties to each other, except  
taking each other's head! 'There can be only one', is the only  
thing between Immortals and you know it. Now keep your damn voice  
down before people start to wonder about our vocabulary."  
  
"It's still just a law created by mortals, nothing you should  
be concerned with," Diego hissed.  
  
"I also happen to believe in it. What if this is a crucial part  
of their evolution? What if when I break off the virus with  
antibiotics they don't gain the full immunity they need the fight  
off a deadlier version of the virus that comes fifty years down  
the line and they all die? You cannot expect me to gamble with the  
lives of an entire species for the life of but one woman. On top  
off that she's forty-one years old, in the harsh circumstances of  
their life she's elderly. In max two years she'll be dead anyway,"  
Dana answered sternly, but with compassion. She wished she could  
do something, she remembered past love ones and how painful it was  
to watch them die.  
  
"It'll be two more years I can spend with her," Diego answered  
vehemently.  
  
"Diego . . . they're all going to die sooner or later. You  
cannot protect them from death. That is the way of things. There's  
nothing I can do," Dana said with sorrow.  
  
Diego spat on her small desk and stormed out of her small  
office.  
  
*****  
  
Two days later  
  
Tears streamed down Diego's cheeks as he knelt at his wife's  
grave. He hadn't moved from this position in thirty-three hours.  
  
"I'm sorry," Dana said, stopping a few meters behind Diego.  
"I've buried loved ones myself. The only thing you can do is  
cherish their memory and visit their graves once in a while. I've  
got several graves I keep intact scattered across space."  
  
Diego did not say anything.  
  
"Come. I'll drop you off at the nearest Starbase," Dana almost  
whispered. Diego nodded and slowly got up.  
  
~~X~~  
  
"Leave me alone for a while, will you?" Dana asked nurse Ogawa.  
  
"Why?" Ogawa asked, confused at the question.  
  
"Just do it," said Dana. Ogawa nodded and left the morgue.  
  
Dana pulled the sheet further away and saw the large hole in  
Diego's chest. Small electric sparks flew around its edges as it  
closed itself back up. Dana gave him an hour, perhaps two before  
he woke up. Dana ordered the computer to play a message when Diego  
would get up and delete it and all references to the message once  
it had been played. Once she was finished Dana went back to her  
ship and left the immediate area.  
  
*****  
  
With a gasp Diego sat up, and smashed his head into steel plate  
above. "Damn!" he cursed. He struggled to move his body back, and  
forth. Finally the drawer rolled open, and he got off. He looked  
around the small office. Through the window in the right wall he  
saw people in Starfleet uniforms mulling about. He grinned,  
*You're all dead sooner or later.*  
  
A chirp distracted him. He walked over to the small desk from  
which it came. The computer on it blinked and he pushed the 'play'  
button. Diego listened to the familiar voice that came from the  
machine and that he couldn't place.  
  
"Hello, Diego," it said. "Welcome back to life. This is the  
armory, you will find your sword there." A blue print of the star  
ship appeared on the computer screen. Diego grabbed one of the  
PADDs that were lying on the table, and with a grin on his face  
downloaded the information into it. "This is how you get to the  
shuttle bay. Get a shuttle and meet me on the second moon of Beta  
Alpha III. This is a challenge. There can be only one."  
  
Diego grinned again, and as he walked out the back he  
whispered, "That there can be."  
  
*****  
  
Second moon of Beta Alpha III  
  
All around her life was dying. The trees, the grass, the  
animals all of them were ready to die. A few days ago a shuttle  
craft carrying a dead crew, infected with Double Helix, had  
crashed on this moon. And now its primitive agricultural society  
was infected and dying along with practically every other life  
form in a sphere several thousand light years in diameter.  
  
Dana sat in a lotus position with her eyes closed beneath a  
half dead tree on top of a low hill forming a wide clearing  
waiting. A small light streaked across the sky and quickly dimmed.  
But then it became visible. A shuttle craft landed a few hundred  
meters away from her. The door opened and a man exited the craft  
and walked towards her.  
  
When the buzz hit her Dana said, "Hello, Diego."  
  
"Well, well, well," Diego said, grinning. "If it isn't Dana  
Scully. How perfect. Not only do I get my revenge on all mortal  
life, but I get my revenge on you as well."  
  
Only then did Dana open her eyes. As she stood up, she asked  
barely able to contain her anger, "That's what this is all about  
huh? The death of your wife?"  
  
"Absolutely," Diego grinned.  
  
"So you're going to kill everybody else's wife, because yours  
died?! Look around you Diego. Same place on the evolutionary scale  
as your late wife's society. How would you feel if your home was  
dying around you?" Dana asked, angry now.  
  
"I don't care. Wasn't it you that told me: 'They're all going  
to die'? . . . You're right, so I figured why not let them die all  
at the same time. Bring forth the Gathering," Diego said in a  
hungry voice, before bursting out into laughter.  
  
  
"The gathering? You want the gathering?" Dana asked  
incrediously.  
  
"Yep. And as long as there are humans Immortals can be born  
among, the Gathering can never come. But now . . . It will be  
glorious," Diego said in an eery awed voice.  
  
"You want the Prize so you can bring her back to life," Dana  
whispered shocked.  
  
"Exactly. The Prize, enough power to rule the universe. Enough  
power to do anything you want, beyond the Q or the Organians. I'll  
rule them all . . . with Santi at my side, alive once more. . .  
even if everybody else has to die!" Diego said, his laugh evil.  
"And if I'm not the winner . . . without Santi I don't want to  
live anyway."  
  
Dana just stood looking at him. Barely able to control herself  
from screaming. She wanted to chop his head off more then anything  
in the Galaxy. Never had she heard of something this evil. Even  
her own past insanity paled in comparison.  
  
"I think it is rather poetic justice, don't you think? Santi  
died of a disease in order to let the rest live . . . now the rest  
is going to die of a disease in order to let Santi live," Diego  
said, grinning evilly.  
  
"I'll let you in on a secret," Dana grinned back at him. "I  
injected myself with the virus and my body has already generated  
the appropriate anti-bodies. As we speak doctors are using your  
very virus as blue print for a mass distributable cure that'll  
follow the very path of your virus and cure everybody. The deaths  
you cause won't be omega, it'll be a couple of trillion at most."  
  
Diego's smile disappeared of his face distorted with rage. "You  
filthy, bitch!!!" Diego roared. Then a little of his anger  
dissipated and he said, "No matter. Once your head is off, I'll  
build myself a new virus, a better one, a deadlier one, they  
will all die!" Diego pulled his sword and charged at Dana.  
  
Dana blocked his first blow with her sword. She swung his sword  
aside, sliced through his belly, stepped past him and skewered him  
through his back out his chest all in one fluent motion. "You  
should have kept up your training instead of obsessing about your  
dead wife's resurrection," Dana said. She pulled her sword out of  
his back and with a violent arc, cut off his head.  
  
Wind started to pick up, small tendrils of electricity arched  
across Diego's dead body. A small tornado of plasma formed over  
his body, and slowly whirled into Dana's direction. Clouds  
gathered. Lightning flashed and thunder rumbled from them. The sky  
turned pitch black, then with a violent crack the first lightning  
blasts from the Quickening entered Scully. She screamed in pain  
and sank to her knees. The tornado of plasma expanded. It  
enveloped Dana, then the half-dead tree and eventually forming a  
circle several hundred meters in diameter. Lightning arched inside  
it, blasting into Dana and out of it, smashing into the tree.  
Parts of it blew apart, but the rest of it started to bloom. The  
signs of the disease disappeared. The grass became green again as  
the whirlwind of electric energy blasted the energy into it.  
Flowers started to bloom as lightning arched into them. The  
whirlwind grew in height and reached the upper atmosphere,  
energizing it. The lightning storm grew, spreading its life-giving  
essence around the whole moon.  
  
Dana screamed in pleasure as Diego's essence blasted into her.  
His pain and insanity overwhelmed her, and for a time there was  
nothing else. She did not notice her sword floating through the  
air. Lightning blast after lightning blast rocked her body and  
gave back life to the land. The virus tried to flee the on coming  
wave of the Quickening's distinctive energy field as it was  
designed to do, but failed as they were trapped inside the life  
forms they infected. The Quickening blasted Dana's anti-bodies  
free and they rode the waves of energy coming from the Quickening,  
destroying the virus wherever it went. As life and death became  
tangible the whirlwind shrunk, centered on Dana Scully and  
disappeared inside of her.  
  
Dana fell back and lay there catching her breath as the  
lightning storm raged across the moon and delivered the cure  
everywhere.  
  
*****  
  
Bridge of the Excalibur  
  
Calhoun pondered the situation. The message received from the  
Enterprise an hour earlier had been surprising. The dead man who  
had created the virus had apparently disappeared from the morgue.  
Then a man resembling him had killed several guards, retrieved the  
virus creator's sword from the armory and subsequently stole a  
shuttle craft, killing several more guards in the process.  
Apparently the men stepped through force fields as if they weren't  
even there.  
  
The looks from his command crew said the same thing he had been  
thinking: 'An Immortal.' The shuttle craft had gone into warp  
moments after leaving the Enterprise's shuttle bay. It hadn't even  
taken the time to clear the warp nacelles. The craft's behaviour  
had stopped puzzling him the moment he had read the message. The  
same thing held true for Dana's abrupt appearance and  
disappearance. He had ordered McHenry to follow the shuttle  
immediately, not bothering to wait to see if the Enterprise needed  
repairs. The warp signature had led to a solar system where the  
man, correction monster, had used the gravitational forces of the  
planet to mask his warp signature. They had lost him since they  
were not in the right position for McHenry to see the bastard warp  
out and with his remarkable abilities determine his course.  
  
His had suggested that they follow the warp trail left by  
Dana's Ambassadorial ship. McHenry had informed him that it was  
untraceable as it had already dissipated. That had left them and  
the Enterprise with nothing but search for the warp signature out  
side the solar system's gravitational influence. Just as they were  
about to proceed they noticed a planet's electrical and  
gravitational fields fluctuating rapidly resulting in several  
bursts of energy in subspace. It had acted to them as a big neon  
sign saying, 'Here I am, come get me!' When they had gotten closer  
they realized it was not a planet, but a moon circling a planet  
that had the fluctuations.  
  
Sensors picked up Dana's ship coming toward them. Not from the  
moon though. She had made sure to make it look like she had not  
been near the moon at all. Calhoun already knew what they would  
find when they got to the moon's surface: a decapitated body and a  
lot of electrical damage.  
  
Dana's ship pulled along side the Excalibur as it and the  
Enterprise assumed standard orbit around the M-class moon. "The  
ambassador is hailing us, sir," Lefler said.  
  
"On screen," Calhoun said.  
  
"Hello, Captain. Mind if I come aboard?" Dana asked with a  
grin.  
  
"I'll meet you in the transporter room," Calhoun said as he  
stood up.  
  
"See you soon," Dana said and terminated the connection.  
  
Calhoun stood up and started to leave. "Captain," Shelby  
stated, "Don't we have to investigate what happened?"  
  
"Do we really have to?" Calhoun asked and continued on his way.  
  
*****  
  
The surface of the moon.  
  
Three people appeared in a column of blue shimmering light.  
Commander Riker looked around and was astonished to see the circle  
filled with life. Shock set in as he saw the decapitated body.  
  
He walked over to it, squatted, and said, "This is the second  
time today I find you like this."  
  
"Sir, this is very strange," nurse Ogawa interrupted.  
  
"What?" Riker asked, getting back up.  
  
"There are anti-bodies to the virus here, sir. And they've  
cured these plants, and I have no idea how they could have past  
across so great an area," Ogawa explained.  
  
"I may have an answer to that," Data said.  
  
"Yes?" Riker asked, while he looked around. How could the place  
where one person died be the place where life is returned to a  
dying world.  
  
"There is a powerful, electromagnetic field centered around the  
body," Data started to explain, looking at his tricorder. "It  
extends up into atmosphere. Its configuration seems to push both  
the virus and the anti-bodies away from this place. The field is  
propagating through the magnetic field of the planet. The virus  
and the anti-bodies are riding it like a surfer does a wave. In  
approximately twelve hours and twenty three minutes this moon will  
be virus free."  
  
"Where did it originate, Data?" Riker asked intrigued.  
  
"Here, sir," Data said a little surprised. "Or more accurately  
the corpse. It seems that the energy field first shot up from the  
corpse into the atmosphere where it changed and propagated around  
the moon."  
  
"How can such an electrical field originate from a dead man?"  
Riker asked, looking once more at the blooming plants and small  
animals scurrying about in astonishment.  
  
"I have no idea, sir," Data answered with a apologetic  
expression.  
  
"Lieutenant?" Riker said turning towards Ogawa.  
  
Ogawa looked around in astonishment before standing up from her  
squat and answering, "It would require examining him while he was  
still alive, sir. But perhaps the autopsy will reveal something."  
  
Riker nodded. "Need anything more?" he asked. When they didn't  
answer he tapped his commbadge and said, "Riker to transporter  
room. Three and a decapitated body to beam up. Energize."  
  
*****  
  
Dana and Calhoun walked along one of the corridors on the  
Excalibur. They chatted about little things, shared jokes and  
enjoyed each other's company. Then stopped as they heard a loud  
noise and ran toward it.  
  
"You take that back!" Si Cwan roared at Kebron. Dana and  
Calhoun looked at each other as they watched the massive Brikar  
and the smaller Thallonian square off in the hall way.  
  
"I will not," Kebron said with the finality of one who had an  
overwhelming advantage. Cwan who seemed a mere insect compared to  
Kebron did not seem daunted by the difference in size at all. Cwan  
kicked out his foot and hit Kebron barely half way up his torso,  
who barely swayed at the impact.  
  
"What's going on!?" Calhoun demanded from them.  
  
Cwan turned his head and saw Calhoun standing there. "This is  
something between him and me!" he exclaimed.  
  
"Not if it results in you two tearing apart my ship. Now what's  
going on?" Calhoun demanded once more.  
  
"I merely suggested that his sister is not all that he has  
cracked her up to be," Kebron rumbled, sounding like an avalanche.  
  
"You merely suggested, that my sister couldn't see the  
difference between a pig and a cow!" Si Cwan yelled, pointing a  
quivering finger at him in range.  
  
"I did?" Zak Kebron the mountainous Brikar rumbled on.   
  
"Yes, you did," Si Cwan screamed. Kebron just raised his torso  
up and back down in what for him was a shrug.  
  
"That's it," Cwan screamed and started attacking Kebron in  
earnest. Kebron gave Cwan a slap. Cwan flew a few meters through  
the air and crashed. He immediately got up and attacked Kebron  
again.  
  
"Stop it! I said . . . Oh, who am I kidding? They can't even  
hear me with that noise," Calhoun said, as he strained to even  
here his own voice above the noise Kebron's body made as it moved  
around to fight Cwan.  
  
"Let's break this up, I'll handle Kebron. You take Cwan," Dana  
said.  
  
"I think I better take . . ." Calhoun started.  
  
"This is no time for being macho. You're mortal, I am not and  
that can come in handy when you go up against a guy that can  
squash you like a bug," Dana interrupted Calhoun's counter offer.  
  
Calhoun considered it for a moment, and agreed. They walked  
towards the two combatants. Cwan tried to out maneuver the massive  
Brikar, and not was not succeeding.  
  
Calhoun grabbed Cwan and whirled him around, "I said, stop it!"  
Cwan threw a punch that Calhoun easily blocked. Then Cwan tried to  
swipe Calhoun's legs from under him, but succeeded only in  
tumbling them both to the floor.  
  
"This far and no further," Dana said as she placed herself  
between Calhoun and Cwan on one side and Kebron on the other.  
  
"I'm going to squash Cwan's neck like a grape fruit," Kebron  
threatened as he walked towards Dana.  
  
"Then you leave me no choice," Dana said and promptly walked up  
the wall and right past Kebron who was too astonished to do  
anything about it. Once Dana was past him she twisted herself  
around and smashed her foot on the bottom of what passed for  
Kebron's neck. A loud crack was heard when her foot connected.  
Dana let the momentum twist her around full circle, bouncing of  
the wall on the other side of the wall lightly before landing on  
the floor.  
  
The sound of the crack snapped Calhoun and Cwan out of their  
fight. They looked at Kebron as his looming figure swayed  
precariously back and forth. They scattered backwards as fast as  
they could when he started falling forward. They managed to get  
out of range just in time as the massive body of Zak Kebron  
smashed to the floor shaking the whole deck.  
  
"That's impossible," the two of them heard Shelby's voice  
behind them.  
  
"How did you get here," Calhoun asked as he looked back and saw  
a security detail behind Shelby holster their phasers.  
  
Shelby looked down and said, "If there wasn't a vacuum out  
there, they could've heard Kebron and Cwan -- I take it fight it  
out on Earth."  
  
Then the three of them turned their attention back to Dana who  
by now had managed to climb past Kebron to join them. "How did you  
that?" Cwan asked stunned.  
  
"Yes, I thought that was impossible. Beating a Brikar with just  
one kick?" Calhoun asked.  
  
"You'd be surprised what you can do if you know someone's  
physiology," Dana answered smoothly, dismissing what she did with  
an air of superiority. "I just hit him on his central nerve-  
plexus. If you hit it hard enough it overloads. Kinda like the  
Brikar version of the Vulcan nerve pinch."  
  
"However," Dana added while her face slowly turned into agony.  
"One should never try that without super fast healing, or a very  
good doctor nearby."  
  
"Why not?" Shelby asked confused.  
  
"Because," Dana started, pulling up her right foot and starting  
to hop on her left. She started stroking her right foot trying to  
alleviate the pain, "that crack was me shattering every bone in my  
foot! Auwie! My sweet little footsie! Au, au, au!"  
  
Calhoun, Cwan and Shelby started laughing at the comical scene  
of Dana hopping around like a mad woman. The security detail soon  
joined in after unsuccessfully stifling their chuckles.  
  
"That's not funny," Dana stated sternly as she stopped hopping  
around.  
  
"Yes, it is," Cwan blurted out, and they all started laughing  
louder.  
  
"Really?" Dana said, without any humor in her voice as she  
gently put her foot down upon the floor. "Do you think it's still  
funny if I shatter the bones in my left foot on your face Cwan?"  
  
Something in her voice told Cwan he better stop laughing or she  
might just do it, and he didn't have impenetrable hide to protect  
him.  
  
"How about the bones in my right fist on your face, Calhoun?"  
Dana said to the still laughing Calhoun. Calhoun coughed as he  
struggled to stop laughing. The scar on his face stood out in his  
reddened face.  
  
"Shelby, I still have a left hand," Dana said and she saw  
Shelby trying to stifle her laughs and barely succeeding. "As for  
the security personnel, by then my right foot would be healed.  
Like right about now," Dana added and walked a few steps forward  
in threat without any hint of a broken foot. With extreme  
difficulty they managed to put on a straight face. Offended, Dana  
stalked off.  
  
With a groan that seemed to come as much from the floor he was  
lying on as himself, Kebron began to stir.  
  
*****  
  
"What have you got?" Picard asked as he sat down at the  
conference table.  
  
"We have investigated the magnetic fluctuations, and determined  
without a doubt that they originated from our mysterious,  
decapitated individual, or from the place he was lying, however,  
we cannot explain how or why," Data said with intrigue.  
  
"Lieutenant," Picard said, looking at Ogawa.  
  
"Apart from organs that seem in too perfect condition for man  
his age, I could find nothing out of the ordinary. If there was  
ever anything out of the ordinary with him, any evidence of it  
disappeared when he died. I've tried to match his records, finger  
prints, DNA pattern, etc. to anyone in our database in the last  
fifty years. Nothing, I want further back, as far as two hundred  
years; still nothing. Which leads me to conclude that he was not  
born on a federation world," Lieutenant Ogawa explained.  
  
"How about how he could disappear from the morgue?" Picard  
asked.  
  
"I have no idea," Ogawa said, apologetically. "Nobody comes  
back from the dead after having that size a hole in your chest. By  
all that I know, the only possibility that comes to mind is that  
somehow that corpse was a clone and that the original came in,  
destroyed it, vaporized it possibly, and left again. And that our  
decapitated friend, is the actual original . . . or another clone  
and the real creator of the virus is still out there."  
  
"But why would you destroy your clone?" Riker asked  
dumbfounded. "I think if you had a dead clone to take your place  
and your home free to go wherever you wanted to go, you wouldn't  
come back to destroy the very thing that allows you your freedom."  
  
"Perhaps he came for the sword. Not the clone. There are a lot  
of people that value a weapon like that beyond reason," Deanna  
suggested, trying to make sense of the situation.  
  
"Then why give it to your clone, and still why destroy the  
clone; he could've gotten the sword without destroying it,"  
Lieutenant Fowley chimed in. "Plus I have no record of anyone  
getting on board the ship. As far as I can tell, he just got up  
and left."  
  
"If he's the original and what we had before was a clone, then  
their DNA would be the same, the computer probably wouldn't have  
picked him up as an intruder, correct?" Picard asked his chief of  
security trying to come with something that would make sense.  
  
"Yes," Fowley answered. "But I would still have a record of him  
getting on board. A transporter signature, a hole in the hull  
where he cut through, but nothing."  
  
"If he uses superior technology . . ." Deanna tried.  
  
Fowley interrupted her, "No, then he would've used the same way  
out as he came in, but he stole one of our shuttles."  
  
"Lieutenant Ogawa, any signs of what severed his head?" Picard  
asked trying to steer the conversation to something useful.  
  
"It was a sword, a razor sharp one, I can get that from the  
type, and amount of lacerations, it was cut in one fluent motion,"  
Agawa answered.  
  
"Anything else?"  
  
"Nothing, I have checked several times. There is not even a  
molecule of material left from the sword," said Ogawa answered  
with an apologetic tone.  
  
"How would that be possible, Data?" Picard asked.  
  
"Three possibilities, sir. One, the sword was of such good  
quality and material that it doesn't leave residue. Two, whoever  
killed him beamed off any residue to make sure it couldn't be  
proven that he or she committed the murder. Three, the magnetic  
storm that originated at the man's position or even from him,  
removed any of the lingering material," Data stated neutrally.  
  
Picard nodded. "So basically we've got a lot of theories and  
possibilities, but when we get right down to it, we have an  
unsolved mystery?" Picard said . He nodded when his crew said  
nothing.  
  
"Since the only suspect and a weak one at that is our lovely  
Ambassador Scully, I think I'll go have a word with her.  
Dismissed," Picard said, feeling depressed. For some reason he did  
not know, he had the impression that he would not be able to catch  
the Ambassador.  
  
"I'll join you, sir," Deanna said even more curious about Dana.  
  
*****  
  
Calhoun's personal quarters  
  
"I've been meaning to ask you something," Dana said, sitting on  
a couch across from Calhoun, a cup of coffee in her hands.  
  
"Go ahead," Calhoun said, taking a sip from his coffee.  
  
"How many people have you killed while you were fighting for  
the freedom of your people? Innocents, I mean, women and  
children," Dana asked her voice heavy.  
  
"It was war, sometimes you cannot avoid killing them," Calhoun  
answered, coldly. "A few thousand at least."  
  
Dana sighed and started telling her story, while remembering  
better days with Calhoun.  
  
~~X~~  
  
2373  
In orbit over Klamish  
Calhoun's bedroom  
  
Dana dragged herself out of Calhoun's bed. She was exhausted,  
but she needed to get out, both of them did. The final process of  
signing the agreements would start that afternoon and she still  
needed to address the Klamish Council of Government. Calhoun had  
his own duties.  
  
The sex with him helped center her after the Quickening, but  
exhaustion on top of the most powerful Quickening she had ever  
experienced had left her drained. She pulled the shirt over her  
head and down over her torso.  
  
Calhoun stepped out the bathroom half dressed. "That was very  
nice," Calhoun said.  
  
"Nice?" Dana asked incredulous.  
  
"Ok, it was fantastic," he said with a grin. "You're the kind  
of woman I'd like to marry."  
  
"Perhaps, but I'm not the woman you're going to marry," Dana  
flashed him a grin, before putting her foot through one pipe of  
her trousers.  
  
"Huh?" Calhoun said as he pulled a red sweater over his head.  
  
"You're in love with another woman," Dana spelled it out for  
him while putting her left foot through the other pipe.  
  
"Oh, really? Who, if I may ask?" Calhoun asked with a sarcastic  
tone as he started putting on his pants.  
  
"Oh, please. As if you don't know," Dana said, putting on the  
next piece of clothing. "And if you really don't know, you'll find  
out soon enough."  
  
"How do you know?" Calhoun asked a bit angry at her suggestion.  
  
"I've had four hundred years of life behind me. Trust me, if it  
isn't the way your eyes change when you look at her, it's the way  
you're making love, or should I say, lack there of and the way you  
have sex. Angry sex, like 'Why isn't she in here with me?'," Dana  
said, giving him a silly smile.  
  
*****  
  
"This is a Klingon book," Dana said to the Council. "It will  
tell you about Honor. It is something your God neglected to  
mention."  
  
"Are the Gods not always correct?" one of the members of the  
Council asked.  
  
"Oh, yes," Dana answered, she needed to get them on there feet,  
without destroying there religion and causing massive chaos. "The  
Gods are always correct, but one God can be wrong. It's the reason  
for you democracy, more heads know more than one. And the Gods  
together know everything.  
  
"The treaty as it stands now is best for you all. You should  
sign it this afternoon, and abide by it," Dana stated, looking  
each of them in the eye one by one.  
  
They nodded. "You will not stay?" Kulon asked a bit  
disappointed. He had been acting strange. Ever since yesterday  
afternoon Kulon had been avoiding her as best as he could.  
  
"No, you must find your own path and follow it. You must evolve  
on your own, that is best for any society. You must learn to be  
independent and think for yourselves. Do not take everything any  
God ever says for granted. We too have criminals among ourselves,  
weigh what they say off against what has been said before, and  
defy them if they try to trick you!" Dana explained.  
  
*****  
  
Later that day  
  
Duncan MacLeod and Dana Scully looked around the area the  
holodeck had conjured up. A lush foliage forest with a beautiful  
clearing with green gras.  
  
"So how do we do this?" MacLeod asked a little apprehensive,  
almost certain of the answer.  
  
"The fastest way to teach each other would be through a mind  
meld," Dana answered a little apprehensive herself.  
  
"Well," MacLeod said as he sat down in a lotus position.  
"Better get to it then."  
  
Dana joined then gently placed her hands on MacLeod face. "Wait  
a moment," MacLeod said a bit nervous. "You certain you can do  
this?"  
  
"It's been almost three hundred years. I've never had much use  
for it. So I think my training is a bit watered down, I might kill  
us, but that won't bother us much now would it?" Dana explained.  
  
"You don't know that. We never died from a mind meld," MacLeod  
said, getting more nervous.  
  
"We'll never find out unless we try, will we?" Dana told him  
with a grin.  
  
MacLeod sighed. "Get on with it."  
  
Dana replaced her fingers on his face and said, "My mind to  
your mind, my thoughts to your thoughts."  
  
The world around them disappeared and was replaced with a  
desert.  
  
"Why a desert?" Duncan asked as he appeared in front of Dana.  
  
Dana felt his power. It was almost frightening. Millennia of  
memories flashed through her mind, only a few of them were his.  
She clamped down upon them, making sure they wouldn't overwhelm  
her. She was beginning to understand how T'Lar must have been  
feeling.  
  
"I think because Nakano kept making an illusion of a desert  
when he was training Connor," Dana said with a bit of a guilty  
tone.  
  
"Oh," MacLeod just said. Kronos was there too. Dana felt him,  
dead, but never buried. His presence was frightening as well  
thrilling. Dana decided to ignore it as best as she could. She  
still remembered the time he took over MacLeod, not something she  
would ever want to relive again.  
  
"I guess we begin," said Dana and a wall appeared in the  
desert. "This is what one basically needs to make in order to  
build complete mental blocks."  
  
*****  
  
"It's that easy, huh?" MacLeod asked as he mastered the art.  
  
"Yep," Dana answered, grinning in the heat of the desert that  
didn't bother any of them. "It's that easy."  
  
"I guess now it's my turn," MacLeod said, and placed his sword  
on the ground. Then it slowly levitated off the ground. Duncan  
grabbed it, and then threw it away. It landed in the sand, MacLeod  
stretched out his hand and sword flew across the desert directly  
into Duncan's hand.  
  
"That's impressive," Dana said a bit astonished.  
  
"Yep, although I don't know whether this is telekinesis the way  
mortals do it. I'll teach you, now. Place your sword on the  
ground," Duncan ordered friendly.  
  
Dana did as she was told. "Now," Duncan said, stretching out  
his mind a bit as Dana had shown him the techniques of the mind  
meld minutes before, adjusting her control whenever needed. "Close  
your eyes. Stretch your Quickening outward . . . that's right, let  
it envelope the sword . . . let the swords magnetic field  
interlock with the Quickening . . . feel the metal's magnetic  
properties interact with your own . . . tie them together, let  
them entangle each other . . . very good . . . now raise the sword  
. . . open your eyes."  
  
Dana looked and saw the sword floating in mid air at chest  
height. "Very good, let go of it."  
  
The sword clanged softly back into the sand. "Raise it again,  
don't think about it, just do it." The sword floated back up.  
"Good," Duncan said, then with a swipe the sword went flying to  
Dana's right and kept standing in the sand with the blade a few  
centimeters in it.  
  
"Now get it back," Duncan said. Dana tried, strained,  
struggled, but the sword stayed where it was. "Don't force it,"  
Duncan said. "Just feel the sword, feel the connection you have  
between it, and pull!" The sword flew at her and she caught it  
deftly with her right hand.  
  
"See, it's that easy, now only doing it out there, in reality,"  
Duncan told her.  
  
The desert disappeared and they were once again in the forest  
generated by the holodeck. Dana and Duncan pulled out their swords  
and threw them in opposite directions. They landed in the soil.  
"Now bring it back," Duncan said, as he pulled on his own sword.  
  
Dana pulled on her sword, it didn't work. Duncan already had  
his own back in his hand. She relaxed, then tried again, this time  
the sword flew through the air and she caught it with her left  
hand.  
  
"It's working. I can do it!" Dana exclaimed with joy.  
  
"Again," Duncan said. Dana spent fifteen minutes improving her  
ability to retrieve her sword.  
  
"All right, I think I got it," Dana said, admiring her sword  
with a grin. "Your turn. Let's see if you can suggest something to  
me."  
  
Duncan thought for a moment, then grinned. *Pee your pants,* he  
forced into her mind with maximum effort.  
  
Dana's jaw dropped, she felt some pee escape into her panties.  
With extreme effort she forced the suggestion out of her head, and  
kept the rest of her urine inside. "You bastard!" she exclaimed in  
indignation.  
  
"Well, now we know I can do it," Duncan grinned mischievously.  
  
"Ok, suggest something again," Dana said sulking, mentally  
preparing herself for it.  
  
"Why?" Duncan asked.  
  
"To build up my defenses of course, it seems my regular blocks  
aren't enough. If someone else ever learns the skill I don't want  
to be caught unprepared," Dana answered him with a face that said,  
'Are you slow, or is it just me?'  
  
"Of course," Duncan said and with a grin he suggested to her to  
do a strip tease.  
  
"God damn it! Can't you think of something more normal? Men!"  
Dana complained. Duncan just grinned. "Ok, my turn," Dana said.  
*Lift your right leg, jump on your left, put your right index  
finger on your nose and take off your pants with your left.*  
  
Duncan began to hop on his left leg, placed his right index  
finger on his nose and as he tried to unbutton his pants he  
dropped to the ground. "Aaargh!" he roared. Dana started giggling.  
Duncan shook his head, got rid of the annoying suggestion and got  
up. Dana laughed at his indignant look.  
  
"Oh, that was funny," she managed through her giggles. *Do it  
again,* she suggested.  
  
Duncan started hopping then stopped before he put his finger to  
his nose. "You're getting better at blocking a suggestion," Dana  
observed.  
  
*Smash your head in that tree,* MacLeod tried without warning  
Dana first. Dana turned towards the tree, after two steps she  
stopped.  
  
"Oah!" Dana exclaimed, "You almost had me!" MacLeod grinned.  
*Hit yourself in your balls!* Dana grinned evilly as she made the  
suggestion.  
  
"You little!" MacLeod exclaimed as he stopped himself just in  
time. They spent several more minutes trading suggestions, both  
getting better at deflecting them with every suggestion.  
  
"All right," Dana said, "I think we mastered that as good as we  
can in one session. Time for defense against illusions."  
  
Several Danas appeared beside her and they attacked. MacLeod  
started deflecting their blows, trying to figure out who was the  
real one. Suddenly he felt a hard slap to his ass of a cold  
material. "Ow!" he exclaimed.  
  
"Got ya," Dana grinned as the fake Danas disappeared. MacLeod  
turned around and saw Dana standing there. The flat of her katana  
in the position to slap his ass.  
  
"That hurt," he said and conjured up a whole army of mad men  
running at Dana. She tried to avoid them, but only succeeding in  
receiving a slap to her own ass from Duncan.  
  
"Damn it," Dana said and turned the area into the blistering  
hot desert of Vulcan for MacLeod. She attacked, and she saw him  
sweating profusely. He tired quickly and stumbled in the desert  
sands. Soon he was on the ground and she removed the illusion, her  
sword at his neck. She grinned for a moment then, offered her hand  
and pulled him up.  
  
Dana heard something cracking, as she turned around she saw a  
tree falling over, and coming directly at her. "Whoa," she said as  
she ducked to floor and rolled aside. She got a violent kick to  
her stomach from MacLeod for her troubles. He followed up with one  
to her head and Dana got angry. She swiped his legs from under  
him, at least she planned to, because instead of him falling over,  
her leg past right through his legs and he disappeared.  
  
"Huh?" Dana exclaimed.  
  
"Right here," he heard Duncan's voice. She turned around and  
saw him grinning and leaning comfortably against the tree that had  
only just fallen over. "So you actually feel the pain, huh?"  
  
"Yeah, speaking of pain," Dana said, and created a man holding  
a red hot poker directly in front of Duncan and let him stab it  
through his head. Duncan winced at first, then relaxed.  
  
"It isn't real," he said, the poker past through his skull  
harmlessly, and he stepped toward Dana, straight through the man.  
Dana grinned.  
  
"Time to die!" Methos, half his face painted blue, roared and  
swiped his sword at Dana's neck. Dana's reflex was to bring up her  
sword, but she was starting to notice the difference between real  
and illusion. She let the sword harmlessly pass through her neck.  
Methos disappeared.  
  
Dana turned the world in a frozen waste land, and stripped  
Duncan naked. She herself still saw him clothed of course, but to  
MacLeod it was as if he was naked. Dana attacked as she saw him  
start to shiver in the freezing cold. Several blows were exchanged  
before he stopped shivering and parry every one of her blows with  
ease.  
  
Dana felt hot, sweat started pouring from her face. As she  
looked around she was in a desert. It wasn't real. Now to breach  
the illusion. She focused and the desert disappeared.  
  
"Final one," Dana said and twenty more Danas appeared around  
her. She changed her position in the mass of Danas, and watched as  
MacLeod did the same. The groups attacked each other and MacLeod  
and Dana clanged their katanas together and locked position. The  
extra MacLeods and Danas disappeared and they grinned at each  
other.  
  
"I guess anyone who has managed to learn that ability will find  
it's useless against us," Duncan said grinning a bit.  
  
"Yeah, that's good for us, bad for them," Dana said as they  
sheathed their swords.  
  
*****  
  
Several days later  
  
The treaties had been signed, the agreements made, the first  
friendships were starting to build and she and MacLeod were ready  
to leave. They were standing before the Klamish governmental  
building. Both diplomatic parties were present. The green  
Hondarians were already looking around for the place to build  
their embassy.  
  
"Well, people," MacLeod said. "This is where our ways part. It  
has been a pleasure working with you all."  
  
"Same here," said Scully. "And I hope that next time I come to  
Klamar and Hondar it's as a tourist. Don't break these agreements,  
you'll be surprised how much you can learn from each other, and  
how much you start to like each other. We learned that with the  
Klingons."  
  
The parties exchanged goodbyes with MacLeod and Dana. Dana  
decided to go check up on Kulon personally. After Dana had found  
out about Calhoun's other love, and knew something long term was  
out of the question, she had tried to come into contact with Kulon  
to see if it could work, but he had been avoiding her and now  
sadly it was too late.  
  
"Why have you been avoiding me? I thought you had an interest  
in me?" Dana asked him softly.  
  
"But you are a God," he answered her just as softly and  
surprised.  
  
"As opposed to you being a 'lowly mortal'?" Dana asked a bit  
mocking. An intimidated nod was her answer. "You have no idea how  
many 'lowly mortals' I took into my bed. And the legends and myths  
about gods bedding mortals . . . you had a pretty good chance."  
  
"I did?" Kulon asked dumbfounded.  
  
"Now it's too late though. Why were you attracted to me  
actually?" Dana asked with curiosity.  
  
"You weren't submissive. Our women all demure in the extreme.  
Such weakness disgusts me," Kulon stated, still with a soft voice.  
  
"I've seen Marloua take a rather big interest in you," Dana  
said, pointing covertly to the female attache to one of the  
Hondarian ambassadors.  
  
"She has?" Kulon asked neutrally.  
  
"Yes, and trust me. Hondarian women are anything but  
submissive. In fact what I've read and heard they are down right  
obstinate," Dana said, grinning at him. She added  
conspiratorially, "Plus she seems to enjoy wearing revealing  
clothing, I've got a feeling you'd enjoy her company."  
  
"Hmm, perhaps I will go find out," Kulon answer and slowly  
stalked over to the woman Dana pointed out.  
  
"Ready to leave, Mac?" Dana asked.  
  
"Yes. Ambassador MacLeod to Excalibur. Two to beam up.  
Energize," Duncan said. A few seconds later they disappeared in a  
sparkling light.  
  
~~X~~  
  
"So in one night, with one order I killed 1.2 billion people of  
which 920 million were innocent, in order to save billions more,"  
Dana finished.  
  
"That's some story," Calhoun said, pondering it. "I can see the  
resemblance with me. You wanted someone like you to talk to?"  
  
"Yes," Dana said. She sighed. "Are you afraid you'll ever kill  
innocents again?"  
  
"No. Not when it's not necessary. When it's necessary I will of  
course," Calhoun said as he looked at Dana staring out the window  
into the stars.  
  
"I am afraid. I'm afraid that next time when I'm faced with  
such a situation, that I will miss other options, that I'll kill  
millions, billions, or even trillions of innocents when I don't  
have to," Dana said looking out into nothingness.  
  
"I think the fact that you're afraid of it, will keep you from  
actually doing it," Calhoun said softly.  
  
"I'm not so sure, but I hope you're right," said Dana softly.  
  
The door chimed. "Who's there?" Calhoun asked.  
  
"It's Picard. I heard Ambassador Scully is here. I'd like to  
have a word with her," Picard said.  
  
Calhoun looked at Scully to check to see whether she wanted to  
see Picard or not. She turned around, and he was impressed by the  
steel gaze. Only minutes before the Immortal had looked fragile,  
now she seemed virtually indestructible. For a moment Calhoun  
wondered whether it was just an act, or whether she really changed  
moods. Calhoun decided to leave it be. Dana gave him a nod and he  
walked to the door and let Picard in.  
  
"Hello, Captain, Counselor," Dana said with a disarming smile.  
  
"Please make yourself comfortable," Calhoun offered, smiling  
inwardly. Dana wouldn't leave a piece of them intact. "Want  
something to drink."  
  
"Don't mind if I do. No drink though," Picard said as he sat  
down. Deanna sat across from him.  
  
"I prefer to stand," Dana said with a small smile.  
  
*Tactical advantage,* Calhoun thought, grinning seductively as  
he sat down next to the lovely Counselor Troi. He placed his hand  
on the back support of the couch behind her. Deanna looked  
uncomfortable at him for a moment. She felt like a predator had  
just sat down next to her and she was the prey. It did not help  
that Captain Calhoun's scar and the deep purple eyes made him very  
attractive. Dana grinned inward at the sight.  
  
"There are a few things that aren't entirely clear to us,"  
Picard started.  
  
"Aah, yes. The great mysteries of the universe, life and death  
and such. Ask the Ambassador Dana Scully she'll answer all of your  
questions. Not! Go talk to a priest, or a vedek or something.  
Don't bother me," Dana interrupted him vehemently. "Cut to the  
chase will you, you're here for one thing only, trying to get me  
to admit I murdered that man."  
  
"You are the only one I know with a sword," Picard accused.  
  
"Calhoun's got a sword," Dana started. Calhoun smiled and waved  
at Picard and Deanna, then with a shrug and an extra smile to  
Deanna settled back into the couch.  
  
"He was on the bridge of the Excalibur, and the ship as close  
to us all the time," Picard said.  
  
"Can you prove he was on the bridge all that time? Or perhaps  
he has an exceptionally good transporter and transported away for  
a couple of minutes?" Dana commented dryly.  
  
"That's beside the point," Picard started, getting exasperated.  
  
Dana interrupted him again, "Oh, really? Why is that beside the  
point? Oh right, that's it. I'm human and I carry a sword. Humans  
aren't supposed to carry a sword, therefor I must be an evil,  
murdering bitch." Dana suddenly stepped forward, placed one hand  
on the armrest of the two-seat couch and the other on the table in  
front of it. She placed her face close to Picard and with  
carefully controlled anger she said, "Listen to me, Picard. I did  
not murder that man!"  
  
"I'm not so sure about that," said Picard as Dana slowly  
straightened back up and a bit intimidated by Scully's attack.  
"But even then there's always the instance of you shutting down  
the Enterprise. I can lock you away for that."  
  
Dana smiled a playful smile, like a cat playing with a mouse.  
"First of all you can't prove I'm the one who sent the commandos  
to shut down the Enterprise, so you can't place me under arrest.  
But if you could and you would lock me away in your brig, you'd  
get a call from the admiralty which will basically entail, 'You're  
fired'. And then I'd be released."  
  
"You can't seriously believe . . ."  
  
"No, I don't believe. I know," Dana said and walked out of  
Calhoun's quarters. Deanna got up and quickly followed her.  
  
*Ouch, that's telling 'em,* Calhoun thought.  
  
"Damn, that woman," Picard muttered and wondering how she had  
managed to change an informal round of questioning into a trial  
where he was the defendant.  
  
"Oh, I don't know. I kind of like her," Calhoun said.  
  
"But she killed that man. You know it as well as I do, even if  
I can't prove it," said Picard with conviction.  
  
"Listen, Picard. Leave it be," said Calhoun gravely. "The  
creator of the virus has been stopped, soon everybody within and  
beyond the Federation will be cured. What more do you want?"  
  
"The solution to a mystery," Picard answered without thinking.  
  
"Trust me, Picard," Calhoun said, this time deadly serious.  
"Some mysteries aren't meant for lowly mortals. Perhaps in a  
thousand years or so, when we're no longer lowly mortals. Leave  
this one alone. You'll only get burned, and besides once you have  
the answer there's nothing you can do with anyway."  
  
"You know something?" Picard asked.  
  
"Just leave it be, Picard," Calhoun said, then got up and  
headed to the bridge.  
  
*****  
  
"What is it that you hide? Are you a human with an extreme life  
span? Genetically Engineered perhaps? Or not even human? An El  
Aurian perhaps?" Deanna asked as she caught up with Dana. "And why  
do you hide it?"  
  
"Why should I tell you?" Dana said, keeping up a brisk pace.  
  
"I'll keep the secret," she offered as she tried to keep up.  
  
"Even from your captain?" Dana asked her.  
  
Deanna hesitated for a moment. "That depends . . ."  
  
". . . On what it is? Sorry, not good enough," Dana said  
without slowing down.  
  
"Aging slower, or not being human is not that much of secret?  
What is such a grand secret that you'll go through such great  
lengths to hide it?" Deanna asked breathing.  
  
"No secret," Dana said dismissively.  
  
Deanna thought for a second, and said, "'It begins where it  
ends: in nothingness.'"  
  
Dana stopped walking abruptly and whipped her head around to  
look directly at Deanna.  
  
Deanna smiled. She had loved the poem when she had found it.  
The possibility that the Ambassador may have written it intrigued  
her. She continued to recite the poem,  
  
"'A nightmare born from deepest fears, coming to me unguarded,  
Whispering images unlocked from time and distance,  
A soul unbound, touched by others, but never held,  
On a course charted by some unseen hand,  
The journey ahead promising no more than my past reflected back  
upon me,  
Until at last I reach the end, facing a truth I can no longer deny  
. . .  
Alone . . . as ever.'"  
  
Dana had an angry look on her face. Deanna faced her, hands  
across her chest in satisfaction, "You wrote this didn't you? In  
2209 to be exact. You wrote it, along with a few others. I must  
say they are very good, filled with symbolism."  
  
Dana looked at Deanna, her head spun a bit, the poem had so  
much meaning for her. She had written it just after Connor's  
death. It touched her deepest core. That Deanna would you use it  
for something this low, to draw her out, made her angry, extremely  
angry. Suddenly her hand shot out, too fast for Deanna to react.  
Dana closed it around Deanna's throat and pushed her up against  
the wall. Deanna's feet dangled a few centimeters above the floor.  
  
"Don't be smug, Counselor. Knowing things does not make  
things better, it might make things worse," Dana hissed. Just then  
a big ball of fur rounded the corridor. Something vaguely  
resembling a Starfleet uniform clung to the creature. It seemed  
ape-like, but with the snout resembling a dog's.  
  
It halted and cheerfully greeted, "Ah, hello, Ambassador."  
  
Deanna couldn't believe it. The woman was holding her in a way  
that barely allowed her to breathe, but the person - Beast?  
Whatever it was - didn't seem to notice her. She tried to scream  
for help, but the Ambassador's hand squeezed a little harder and  
made sure she couldn't get out a single syllable.  
  
"Hello, Janos," said Dana friendly.  
  
"Will you be joining Burgy and me in holodeck for our sparring  
again? After that awful flue that went around, we could all use a  
good workout, get all the bat particles out of our system, you  
know? You do remember when we workout, don't you?" Janos asked  
with a feral grin.  
  
"Of course. It will be difficult to attend though but I'll see  
what I can do," Dana grinned at the giant talking ball of fur.  
  
"Good. Perhaps you can ask the captain to join us, he's over  
due," Janos happily suggested.  
  
"If I can make it, I'll be sure to ask him," Dana answered.  
  
"OK. Have a good day, Ambassador," Janos said, and started  
bounding through the corridor again.  
  
"Same to you, Janos," Dana called after him. She turned back to  
Deanna. She loosened her grip and said, "Now, where were we? Ah,  
yes, knowing things. I know you have that picture that resembles  
me so much. Don't think it'll do you any good, little girl! I've  
killed more people than you could ever imagine. One more won't  
matter!"  
  
"You won't kill me. You can't kill me. Not without being locked  
up in prison, where they'll be sure to find your secret, sooner or  
later," Deanna choked out.  
  
Dana let her go. Deanna dropped to her knees gasping for air.  
"You think so, huh? Then you need to check your clues again,  
girly." Deanna watched as Dana walked away with a fear in her  
eyes.  
  
*****  
  
"Kebron, my ready room, now," Calhoun ordered, pissed off as he  
entered the bridge. He walked across the bridge.  
  
"Yes, sir," Kebron said, and started following Calhoun with  
massive steps.  
  
Calhoun sat down in his chair and said, "Why did you provoke,  
Si Cwan."  
  
"Cheering him up, sir," Kebron said, in his trade mark  
avalanche voice.  
  
"Cheering him up? I wasn't aware he needed cheering up. He's  
got his sister back," Calhoun asked in astonishment.  
  
"That's the problem, sir. Or rather who she brought with her,"  
Kebron said.  
  
"What has Xion got to do with it?" Calhoun asked confused.  
  
"First it brings him in your debt even more than he already is,  
sir. Your son saving her life. Second, no offense, but your son  
isn't exactly marriage material," Kebron rumbled. He didn't like  
to speak in long sentences. It suited his style better to give  
answers of only a few words, but this was something that required  
long sentences.  
  
"Aah, so you thought you'd let him beat his frustrations away  
on your untouchable hide? But I didn't think you'd be the one to  
want to cheer him up," Calhoun said with a frown.  
  
"He knows more about this area of space than all of us  
combined," Kebron simply stated, not bothering to explain further.  
  
"Aah, don't want him distracted when things get critical, eh?"  
Calhoun answered, than added with a grin. "You just weren't  
expecting the one-kick Ambassador, were you?"  
  
"My hide still saved the day and Cwan's mood, sir," Kebron  
rumbled, a flicker of unease passed through him.  
  
"Yes, when one-kick Ambassador, turned into hopping-on-one-foot  
Ambassador. That would cheer up almost anybody. It must've hurt  
your pride. If it makes you feel any better, let me remind you  
that she has four hundred years of experience in kicking people's  
butts," Calhoun said, grinning an insightful grin.  
  
"No, my pride is not hurt, sir," Kebron rumbled with  
indignation. "But thank you none the less."  
  
"Off course not. What was I thinking. You're dismissed,"  
Calhoun said. The room vibrated as Kebron stomped out of his ready  
room.  
  
*****  
  
"Captain," Fowley said. "We've got a communique from the  
doctors. They have succeeded, sir. A mass distributable cure has  
been completed. A data transmission is imbedded in the audio."  
  
"Transmit it to sickbay, Mr. Fowley. I take it the Excalibur is  
receiving a transmission as well?" Picard asked.  
  
"Yes, sir," Fowley answered.  
  
"All right then. Sickbay?" said Picard. His thoughts were still  
mulling over the mystery they were facing here in Sector 221-G and  
whether he should take Calhoun's advice. "How long until you have  
enough synthesized to seed a planet?"  
  
"Approximately forty-five minutes, Captain," Lieutenant Ogawa  
answered.  
  
"Helm, can we pick up Dr. Crusher within that time without  
losing any precious minutes needed for spreading the cure?" Picard  
asked.  
  
"At warp 9.7, we can get to Rania III in twenty-five minutes.  
Enough time for us to pick up Dr. Crusher, find out if Rania III  
can distribute the cure themselves or if they need help, and still  
get to the nearest inhabited world in time, sir," the helm officer  
responded.  
  
"Set course and speed, helm. Mr. Fowley, contact the  
Ambassador," Picard ordered.  
  
"Yes, Captain?" Dana answered from the bridge of the Golden  
Eagle. There was no hint of what had transpired in Calhoun's  
quarters earlier.  
  
"The cure is complete. We'll be heading to Rania III to pick up  
the doctor and then distribute it," Picard said with an authority  
he didn't feel whenever he addressed Ambassador Scully. She had an  
illusive quality to her that she didn't like.  
  
"I heard from the Excalibur, Captain. They're preparing to  
leave themselves. I'll be going back Rania III. I won't be  
arriving there as fast as you, but I will get there," Dana  
answered Picard in an all business tone.  
  
"Understood. Picard out," Picard said, glad he did not have to  
deal with her anymore. "Well, number One. It seems we're leaving  
this mystery unsolved," Picard said with regret.  
  
"It seems that way, sir. But we've good more pressing matters  
to attend to," Riker answered. He shifted in his chair in  
anticipation.  
  
"Indeed we do, Number One. Indeed we do. Helm, engage," said  
Picard.  
Epilogue 1: The Story Ends  
  
". . . And so the cure to the virus was released, and it  
spread across the Galaxy, curing anyone it came in contact with,  
thanks to the willingness of one Immortal to sacrifice herself.  
The monster who created the virus was destroyed once and for all.  
Everybody lived happily ever after . . . until the next virus, or  
war," Dana said. She grinned as she looked around the group of  
attentive listeners. She had omitted some of the flashbacks she  
had and juiced up the sexual part for the benefit of Frianne.  
Instead of threatening to torture Chalook, she had fucked the  
answer out of him, but other than that the story had been faithful  
to what had really happened.  
  
They sat there stunned at what she claimed to be a true story.  
Then Fox piped in, "Wait a minute, wait a minute. This story is as  
fantastic, if not more fantastic, than Djixion's story over here.  
How do we know yours isn't as bogus as his?"  
  
"Yeah," Djixion agreed in indignation. The others soon agreed.  
  
Dana smiled at them enigmatically and slowly got up. She picked  
up her coat and her backpack and put them on. "Well, aren't you  
going to tell?" Frianne purred.  
  
Dana just smiled, then walked around the group.  
  
"Yours is bogus. Or else you would tell. Well? Why is your  
story real," Fox asked his gaze focused on her in curiosity.  
  
"All right," Dana said, giving them a wider grin. She walked  
directly behind Fox and squatted down. She let her eyes slide over  
the people in the circle. She bent forward, placing her mouth  
close to Fox's left ear. Softly, just loud enough for them all to  
hear, she said, "Because the name of your family's guardian angel  
is not Tara Kelly. . ." Dana then switched to Fox's right ear and  
continued, ". . . But Dana Katherine Scully and. . ." Dana paused  
for a moment to build up tension, and then continued, ". . . so is  
mine."  
  
By the time Fox had whipped his head around in astonishment she  
was nowhere to be seen.  
Epilogue 2: Sela  
  
Room 156  
Imperial Hospital in Shavrak  
Romulus  
2376  
  
"Sir, she says a human Ambassador sent her to you. We shouldn't  
trust her," the man said in respect.  
  
Palek waived him aside and croaked out, "Send her in."  
  
Sela was held tightly by two armed guards and was pushed to her  
knees in front of Palek.  
  
"Well, Sela. How is it going?" Palek asked with a squeaking  
voice.  
  
"Bad," Sela answered annoyed  
  
"You're honest; that's a good start," he said with difficulty.  
"What brings you here?"  
  
"A female, Human ambassador told me some remarkable things. She  
said you could verify them for me. I want to find out, whether she  
speaks the truth or not," Sela answered with hostility.  
  
"Hmm. What is this ambassador's name?"  
  
"Dana Scully. Oh, she said to tell you something: 'Purity',"  
Sela said calming down. A sudden silence filled the room,  
indicating to Sela she had pushed the right button.  
  
"Really," Palek managed. "How's your mother, Sela?"  
  
Sela spit on the floor in disgust. "My mother is dead. And I  
will have nothing to do with her!" she exclaimed with bitterness.  
  
"Too bad," Palek stated. "I knew your mother, remarkable woman.  
Sacrificed herself so her crew could live. Than you throw a  
tantrum when she tried to escape with you, and she was executed.  
Must have been tough on you; knowing that you're partially  
responsible for her death."  
  
"No, I was glad when they killed her. Never wanted to have  
anything to do with her and anything Human ever again," Sela said,  
vehemently.  
  
"I wonder," Palek croaked. "Whether that's real, or just  
something you made up to believe in later in your life."  
  
Sela was shocked again as flashes of memories she didn't want  
entered her mind. "That's what she said," Sela blurted out  
shocked, but regained control quickly.  
  
"What did she tell you?" Palek managed, it became more  
difficult to talk by the minute for him. Occasionally his strength  
would return to him, only to slip away again soon after.  
  
"That the humans who created the virus and attacked us were  
bitter enemies of today's humans. That they thought they had all  
been dead, but that they were wrong. And thus we ended the war  
with them," Sela said intimidated.  
  
"That is true," Palek answered as he sunk himself deep in  
thought. Sela's face filled with shock, reality threatened to be  
pulled away from her. "Now comes the question about what to do  
with you."  
  
"We can't let her join us, sir. We cannot risk it, her past is  
too dubious," the man directly below Palek in the hierarchy stated  
powerfully.  
  
"I know, I'm not senile you know," Palek said a bit angry.  
"Sela, I am not in the position to find out if you're worthy, so  
give me a good reason why you think you are."  
  
"I am loyal. I have proven that, I think," Sela answered him.  
  
"Loyal to the Romulan people or to the military?" Palek croaked  
out once more.  
  
"The people, of course," Sela said without hesitation.  
  
"Are you certain about that?" Palek asked with a grin.  
  
"Yes," Sela answered convinced.  
  
"Sharvuta, leave us, this is not for your ears," Palek ordered  
weakly.  
  
"But . . ."  
  
"Leave," Palek said, and the group left. "The Tal Shiar was set  
up to protect Romulans from a terrible secret and the virus that  
the Humans used to attack us. I'm setting up a new group to carry  
on those goals, as you can see. The Tal Shiar is corrupt, like  
most of the Romulan government. Luckily I have been able to keep  
this knowledge from them. The Humans have built a similar  
organization, even now they protect us all from the virus."  
  
"Sela, I see in you great potential, but I do not know if you  
will ever let it out," Palek groaned. "I cannot make that  
judgement, but I can send you to people who can. Which leads to  
the question; how far are you willing to go?"  
  
"If Romulus needs to be protected against this virus that's  
still around, all the way," Sela answered with utmost certainty.  
  
"Are you certain about that?" Palek asked voice cracking. "You  
will be submitted to a grueling training regime, and tested  
psychologically, by the very people you hate: Humans. And if they  
decide you're not good enough or not worthy enough they won't let  
you go; they will kill you."  
  
"I understand, but if that what it takes to help protect  
Romulus, I will do it," Sela answered solemnly.  
  
"Good, then," Palek said, looking into her eyes. "Find the  
organization called Section 31. How someone goes about doing that,  
I have no idea. Perhaps use the number, or the code word the  
ambassador gave you. You see, the problem is that the organization  
does not exist."  
  
"Ok," Sela answered confused. She thought at first that the old  
man really had become senile, but changed her mind when she saw  
the strength in his eyes.  
  
"Now, go," Palek said. "And don't forget the code word. It's  
probably the only thing that will keep you from getting killed as  
soon as they find you."  
  
"Yes, sir," she answered, not entirely sure what to do now.  
  
*****  
  
Dreamland 2  
Section 31 Headquarters  
  
Section 31 needed to be expanded and reorganized, thought  
Admiral Brand as he read the report about the incident. The  
Ambassador had saved them all from destruction. But it should  
never have come this far. Section should have found the bastard  
and stopped him a long time ago. Yes, the reorganizing he had been  
vying for would begin once he submitted his recommendation and  
report to Starfleet.  
  
The door chimed and as he looked up from PADD he said, "Come."  
  
Ensign Tarka entered and said, "Sir. We have her."  
  
"Send her in," Brand ordered. Two men pushed a a blonde woman  
into his office and sat her down in the chair. Brand waved and  
they left.  
  
*This is getting tiresome,* Sela thought about her rough entry.  
When Brand didn't say a word, she said, "I'm supposed to tell you,  
'Purity'." When he still didn't say a word, she began to fidget.  
  
"So, how much do you exactly know?" Brand finally asked.  
  
"Not very much, bits and pieces. The relationship between  
Romulus and the Federation isn't what it seems to be, due to the  
fact that you are enemies of the Humans that initially attacked  
Romulus with a deadly virus. You keep all of us safe from said  
virus, but that is all, I don't even know a drop more," Sela  
answered, glad he finally spoke.  
  
"You would like to know more, I take it. And help protect?  
Hmm?" Brand asked, as gently turned the seat of his chair from  
left to right in a hypnotic fashion. Brand placed his hands  
together and regarded Sela for a moment as she answered  
affirmative.  
  
"Fine," Brand decided. "We'll check whether you have the goods  
to become a productive member of our organization. I'll send you  
to our training camp." Brand tapped his commbadge and said,  
"Somebody get her, and send her to Japan. We'll see where training  
her leads."  
  
The door opened and an Andorian entered. "Follow me," he said.  
Sela got up and followed him, relieved things were finally moving  
on.  
  
When Brand was alone once more he pushed a button on his  
computer. A Japanese middle aged woman appeared on screen. "Did  
you follow all that, Mai?" Brand asked.  
  
"Yes, I did," she answered.  
  
"Agree with my decision," Brand asked curiously.  
  
"On training Sela and the reorganization I agree with you on  
both," Mai answered.  
  
"Remarkable woman, isn't she?" Brand asked with serious  
expression.  
  
"The ambassador, you mean? Absolutely, she's Ninja, you know.  
Trained with us, trained her partially myself even, and she in  
turn trained all of us in things we didn't know. It got us to  
understand we were a bit too isolated, and then when we decided  
to come out of that isolation she introduced us to Section 31,  
and, as you know, we became trainers Section 31 operatives," Mai  
explained to Brand.  
  
"Really? I didn't know she trained with you," Brand said,  
filing the information away. "How long ago was that?"  
  
"Over thirty-five years ago. She hasn't aged a day, as you well  
know. But I have no desire to know her secret," Mai said without  
humor.  
  
"Well, keep me posted on Sela's progress, or lack thereof  
should it prove to be the case. Brand out," the Admiral said and  
turned off the transmission. He leaned back in his chair,  
stretched himself, yawned, and decided he had been up for too long  
and went to bed.  
  
The End  
  
More notes: Well, that's it. If you've read my earlier stories  
you're starting to notice a pattern in the Epilogues, aren't you?  
Well, let me keep you guessing. (Heh, heh. Bastard aren't I?)  
Anyway next up is the actual sequel to 'Wormhole Dead Ahead'  
called 'Two Little Ships, Far Far Away.' Once that's finished I'll  
start the Ezri Quadrology, chronologing Dax's brush with  
Immortals, and the answer to why Dana knew about Dax all the way  
back in the 23rd century.  
  
Want to sent me feedback? Want to sent me unrelenting praise? Or  
just bug the hell out of me, write me at: 3d.master@chello.nl 


End file.
